Fab Feb 2009 - hey ho, hey ho, its off to babyproof we go...

[dinkystinky]

off we go again

Ice cream? Clapham? Nardulli. Not been... YET!

damn dp for being at the cinema with dd. i want to take her there now, obviously just for her benefit you understand.

I had a slightly better night and definitely seems a bit better. is having a sleepfest today catching up. 3 hour 'nap' this morning and about 2 hours into another one now.

i love taking I swimming. coco can you find a friend you could rope in that might think it fun to be surrounded by kids splashing and making too much noise?

I want to go there for icecream!

I was going to take DD to the Natural History Museum this half term and persuade some of you to come and meet me for coffee but the tickets are over £100 on the train now, they were only £50 when I started looking. Gutted I didn't book them sooner.

Nevermind, will we have a Christmas-ish meet up?

Ooooooh hang on I just found some cheaper tickets....

MS I just found a return for both of you for £49.50...

Have had day from hell with DS1. Since he's been recovering from SF he's been really grumpy and whiney but today he had the loudest and longest tantrums I've experienced. I was actually worried the neighbours might call the police. He's in bed now having screamed himself hoarse... I am now ready for bed too.

Would love to have a large glass of something medicinal but Mr T still not well and I need to stay alert. He's very coughy and now a bit wheezy so I guess we'll be off to GP in the morning.

Swampy well found clever girl! I have long had a bit of a dream to open an ice cream parlour so I think I'll be visiting it soon for research purposes. Though as I type I am tucking into a bowl of homemade cinnamon ice cream which is quite heavenly.

If you fancy a pilgrimage I will meet you - and any other Fab Feb ice cream afficionado - there.

Don't envy you that tantrum!

MS, do you have a Family Railcard? Eek at the fares.

God THOM - that tantrum sounded painful! Hope DS1 is in a better frame of mind today and that Mr T had a restful night and is better today. Enjoy your icecream pilgrimage.

Elkie - sounds like you had a lovely Saturday. I'd really recommend the theatre production of Giraffes cant dance as its perfectly tailored to little people ... even kept Danny enthralled for the 45 minutes it was on. A cafe next to a building site would be DS1's idea of heaven!

KBN - glad I is on the mend now. Hope you had a good night's sleep last night. Danny amazingly slept well last night and only woke up once for a feed at 2ish - its truly amazing what a difference one good night's sleep makes. We lowered Danny's cot to the lowest setting yesterday as he's started pulling himself to stand and I'm convinced he will try to escape the cot in the middle of the night. Quite glad we did as this morning went in to find him practicing launching himself at the side of his cot...

DS1 has decided he's afraid of the dark. Any of you have any top tips on nightlights for preschoolers (he has the bunny clock but apparently a sleeping bunny is not reassuring enough for him )?

Dinky we have this one which DS1 likes. The other thing I used to do with him was to lie in bed with him in the dark and point out all the furniture etc so everything seemed less scary.

feckin hell A is a stubborn child

i'm desperately trying to teach him to settle back to sleep without needing to feed every 20-30 mins all nightbut holy god i think he's breaking me! It's not like i'm leaving him to cry fgs, just refusing milk more often than every 2 hours (which is much more than most babies his age would be having) but he's not a happy chap

on the plus () side he's pulling up on furniture and trying to stand with no support... looks like he's going to skip a step again and go straight to walking from his peculiar crawling on hands and feet movement

sorry so many of you have sick kids, dd was off school for 3 days last week with a cold but luckily it was mild and i ended up not using the ABs the doc gave me... she mortified me by having such a meltdown on wednesday that i had to take her back out of school

dinky, we use those light activated lights that you get in hardware stores for the kids, they only come on when it's dark and aren't overly bright so don't disrupt their sleep... like this, you can get them in argos i think

Thanks THOM and BRT - will check those out. Would quite like one of those luminous buddies for myself....

BRT - the frequent waking may well be developmental thing as sounds like A is developing in leaps and bounds (almost literally!) which is throwing his sleep well and truly out. I feel your pain on the frequent waking front - have you tried maybe giving him a muslin/soft toy he could chew/suck on to go to sleep instead of you? Danny has discovered he can suck the front of his grobag which is apparently a satisfactory mummy substitute when mummy refuses to get up to feed him again

i have a pile of soothing stuff bigger than him in the bed with us, he won't tolerate the dummy, thinks i'm trying to attack him with the muslin and does love a Nuby cup filled with water but drenches himself and me with it so it doesn't exactly help him to sleep.

i'm not expecting miracles but every 3 hours would be much more manageable than him barely falling asleep before he wakes up wanting more milk.

i think the quick development isn't helping but the biggest issue is his clinginess... he's very much a mommy's boy and wants to be in my arms, preferably clamped onto my boob 23 hours of the day! if he falls asleep in my arms and i put him down he wakes up in a rage at the indignity so mostly i'm working on teaching him to sleep out of my arms... at the minute i've got a folded up duvet on the living room floor and if he wakes when i put him down i cuddle and shush him on that and try and disengage before he's completely asleep.

Oh BRT sounds like a nightmare. I really recommend the Baby Whisperer tips (you may already have read and tried these!). Sam will generally only settle with a dummy but I know that at some point we will be getting rid of it so I will be getting the books out in the near future! Am at A and other babies pulling up on furniture! Sam's still pretty lazy - he sits really well and can stretch amazing distances to grab toys, but he still doesn't like being on his tummy, so maybe he's skip the crawling atage too. DD didn't crawl til 10 months and walked at 16. I'm very happy to wait that long for Sam!

Not been finding much time to MN since going back to work - had a busy weekend and even had our first lot of friends round for dinner since Sam was born. At last I think it's starting to work with two children - I really couldn't see how I was going to cope during the first few months.

I'm finding the work thing hard. Getting us all out of the door for 8am is a challenge, and I have to half run from the station to collect them by 6pm. Sam is generally so tired that he's in bed by 6.30, and O by 7, which means I hardly see them. We'll have to see how it goes. I'm trying to but together a business plan to cut down to 3 days instead of 4. I think that balance would be better.

Apologies for not reading the thread fully, but it sounds like there are/have been a few sick little ones - hope they are on the road to recovery. I know what you mean about antibiotics, but sometimes it's the only thing that's shift an infection.

I've taken it upon myself to hold a little halloween party for our NCT group - does anyone know where I can get some decorations from that are suitable for toddlers? All the stuff I've seen has been real skull and crossbones, daggers and blood, witches etc. I don't want to scare them! Just some spiders and pumpkins would be great!

I'm pretending to do some work but should get back to it now, but will stop by later...

STW/Z - I too am hating not seeing my little ones much since going back to work and dont seem to have enough hours in the day to do everything! Re Halloween decorations - try Tesco - they have little pumpkin/ghost toys which are cut and pumpkin balloons which seem fairly toddler friendly.

Cute not cut!

Thanks Dinky - will check Tesco out at the weekend.

Feeling very down about the work thing today . It's all about guilt as usual!! I got home last night and DD was clinging to me for ages saying over and over "I'm sorry Mummy" and when I said goodbye this morning she did the same. I hope she doesn't think I'm leaving her because she's been naughty .

Oooh, just remembered I have a meeting - gotta dash.....

sorry STW
It is so hard combining work and small children (I am not back yet but will be in new year), sometimes I think society's gone a bit mad, and while women now are not imprisoned in the kitchen/home and have the opportunity for careers and all that, there is no/little acknowledgement by society that women are the primary care-givers and (unfairly) primary housekeepers so we are all run ragged by trying to do everything and be everything and not let anybody down, least of all our children. Plus everything (housing etc) is so bloody expensive we have no option but to work our arses off whether we want to or not!
Sorry, the rant is probably not very helpful, but I have felt what you are feeling now, and will be feeling it in the new year. don't know what the solution is really.
One piece of advice I read in a book tho and found helpful was to act as though you are very positive about your arrangements re work etc, even if you have reservations underneath, as DD may be picking up on you feeling doubtful/ambivalent about work and that is why she is 'sorry'?

hello all, not been around for a while as have been trying to cope with RL. Had a few bad weeks and had some really nasty personal comments made on here a few weeks ago (not this thread of course!) which put me off coming on for a while and was trying to go cold turkey. I just don't understand why people have the need to be so spiteful

Sorry there have been so many sick DCs and hope they are all recovering.

STW/Z hope its not too bad being back at work and that you soon settle into a routine.

BRT, H is just the same! Reading your posts they could have been written by me. I am absolutely drained and fed up of having him permanently latched on. DH is away (in UK) on business at the moment so its really hard, particularly as nursery still not open apparently it re-opens Saturday which annoyingly is not one of DD's days but she will go Sunday if there is a god! DH not back til Midnight Friday so basically misses all our weekend (today and Friday) which is a bloody pain.

Signing classes going well, have 3 classes each week and done 2 weeks so far. First class was a bit scary but went ok and Tuesdays went really well and am getting loads of enquiries about it which is good. Its crap money but a nice feeling to be earning again.

Hope everyone is ok

LOVE that name, MoS!

Morning all, haven't been on for a while either - complete nightmare with solicitors and we still haven't exchanged we are supposed to be moving 7 weeks tomorrow but i wouldn't be surprised if it is right on top of Christmas now.

Great name MOS sorry that you had a tough time on here recently, i agree some threads really do get out of hand and people get all nasty and personal - its a shame and i don't know why it happens.

STZ I second Tesco for cute halloween decorations, i took Milo to Asda recently and was walking down their Halloween isle and he had an absolute benny, just started crying and trying to get out of his seat into my arms - was absolutely terrified by a shaking prisoner/ghoul bless him - can't believe that he is scared of stuff like that at 8 months already, needless to say i will be avoiding that isle for a few years.

Sorry have only read this page and a bit of the previous one - hope everyone's DC's are on the mend now and all that have gone back to work have settled in ok

mos, i saw that thread and it was fairly bizarre what a grudge against lawyers some of those posters had, so sorry you got such weird and nasty posts directed at you

STZ... about your dd finding it tough being away from you all day, i really hope things get easier for you guys soon.

Hello all so sorry i have not been on. Both little ones have been very ill. They both still have nasty colds and coughs but I am now able to move again without them attached to me...

I havent had time to catch up yet but was wondering if I could ask some advise. Owen's diet is still dairy free and I have been using goats cheese and soya milk in cooking and on cereal etc. He also has soya yoguarts. Someone has said that I shouldn't be giving him soya in any quantity as it has hormones in it that and not good for baby boys!!! He has been having it since he was six months

BRT you have my baby... He is still feeding every two hours at night.. Sometimes every hour.... I am still cosleeping as he wakes up so much and I cant keep walking from one room to the next... He also only naps for 20 mins during the day so we are all very tired... but on the plus side no AF yet...