December 2007 - Not Quite Two, Already Terrible ;)

[claraquack]

Just checking that this worked....

Yes I'll be looking for house moving tips this week!

Hi Spiralqueen. Although we have done a lot of moving in the last couple of years, I haven't had to move with a two year old and I personally think this is one of the hardest times to move them (sorry!). In fact, I am glad we have nothing planned for the next couple of months as dd2 seems so unsettled after even a few days away - ie even our short trip to Florida seemed to really have thrown her: whereas before she would go to sleep really easily, now it takes forever....

Having said that, the best thing I would say you should do is keep them in their exact routine as much as possible, eg same bedtime routine, same times for things etc. Make sure their bed/cot is up and ready for them at bedtime so they feel more secure about going to bed, but also be prepared to have to spend more time getting them to sleep etc. Also be prepared for a degeneration in their behaviour, more tantrums etc. You might not even associate it with the move, as their behaviour might change gradually (this is what we found with dd1 when we moved to and then back from Pakistan). Of course you might be lucky and find they are fine.

Finally I would talk to them in advance about moving, they do understand a lot at this age, more than we give them credit for, and they might not understand that when you get to your new place they are not just staying a few days and then going back again.

HTH and good luck with it all!

It is official - Dh has got the job!

He met the MD, and despite making the embarrassing faux pas of addressing him by the wrong name, they got on like a house on fire! He was impressed that DH has had quite a long stint at his current company with a few promotions along the way, as they wanting people with staying power who want to progress with the comapny.
They have come up with a fantastic offer as well salary wise - it is not far off what dh and I were both earning, when we initially bought the house we are currently living in, so that has eased my worries with regards to our ability to get another mortgage - my income will be disregarded as I haven't been self-employed for long enough.
Have spoken to the estate agents, they are coming out in the new year to assess the house, but we have noticed that another house down the road has gone on the market for £10,000 than the original purchase price(this is a new build estate), so again it is all looking positive!!

BT Wooohoooo!!!! Well done DH!

SQ Thanks for the pg best wishes. 27 ish weeks and feel like the back end of a bus.

Have a wonderful Christmas everyone

Happy Christmas Buzzy, I see from the tracking Santa site (Norad) that it's already Christmas day with you. I am so confused as to the time difference but it's still Christmas eve morning here!

Well done BT's DH, what a nice Christmas present for you all.

Merry Christmas Eve everyone! Hope you all have a fantastic day with your families and LOs ...

I'm tracking Santa too on Norad Clara!

Congrats on DH's job BT!!!

Thanks for all your good wishes about Evie's eyes again, she had her appointment on Tuesday and thankfully all is well, they checked her vision again and then gave her drops to dilate her pupils and fix them there so they could have a good look at the back of her eyes. All looks well and they say the white/yellow eye is probably to do with camera angles (and that bright blue eyed people are more likely to get red-eye in pictures). So they have now discharged her and I don't think they will even want to check her next year - the best Christmas present I could have!

That is fab news Beckle!
Glad everything is fine, still think you were right to have it checked out.

Happy Christmas Buzzy! Hope you and the DDs are having a wonderful day!

Congrats MrBT and great news Beckle!

Happy Christmas everyone!!! Almost over here is NZ - only half an hour to go.
Clara I think we're about 18 or 20 hours ahead of you as the dateline goes down the middle of the pacific.
I tried to do the Norad thing last night but couldn't get it to work
Anyway thanks for all the good wishes and we've had a very nice day. DD2 got rather over-excited at times but on the whole was pretty well behaved (unless you count hogging almost a whole pottle of hummous!) and DD1 was thrilled with all her presents so that was lovely.
We're heading off first thing in the morning to a friend's holiday house for a couple of days - they're not using until Dec 28 so decided to make the most of it!
Hope the weather's not treating you all too badly - looks apalling on the news here. Forecast where we're going tomorrow is for 25 degrees. IIm used to Xmas summers having been brought up in NZ, but the snow on Xmas cards and some of the traditions still seem somewhat incongruous.

It has been cold but sunny on Teesside, snow is starting to melt.

DS has been enjoying his presents. At first he didn't want to open any, but he is not well at the moment,poor baby is full of a cold
But when we got back from Church he start getting into it more and has opened all his Christmas presents now! Didn't eat much of his dinner.

He is now happily playing with his new cars - DTB2 bought him a ELC garage with 2 emergency vehicles, it flashes and make noises when the garage doors open and the vehicle come out.
DTB1 and his DP bought DS a Cars storybook which he loves too! He also loves his Thomas trike from Nanny

And he made me a cup of tea in his new kitchen lol.

Happy Christmas everyone, hope you all had a lovely day. Our girls seemed to like the presents and mostly had a great time. Tears and tantrums by the afternoon (to be expected) but we survived and now they are back at holiday school - hurrah - so I can relax. I feel slightly guilty sending them to school but as we have no family here the holidays are pretty hard work. I am excusing it because when my parents come to stay in a few weeks I will take the girls out of school to make up for the time they had to go during the holidays (not that they mind, I think dd1 in particular was looking forward to some company her own age!).

The good news is that Martha appears to be toilet training herself. We appear to have by-passed the potty altogether and she now asks to go to the toilet fairly regularly. It's easy to leave her without her nappy on here and I think that helps. But it seems to have happened very suddenly so I hope she has "got" it now. She is waking up with a dry nappy too, which is a bonus.

The bad news is she is a nightmare to get to sleep still. Lots of crying and screaming, I just don't think she wants to go to bed as life is far too much fun now. We still have her in a cot and can't make the decision about moving her into her toddler bed. What have others done? It could make bedtime easier or it could all be much, much worse..,..

Well done on the potty training,Clara!!

Got more news, my NCT friend who was expecting on the 23rd, had a baby boy wee hours of Christmas morning! Was in active labour for an hour, he was 9lb 14oz, I think - huge! But so gorgeous! His big brother (who is 2 in february) looked pretty taken with him

BT - a Xmas baby!!

Gosh clara how good is that!

Actually had my old GF contented toddler book out the other day to have a look at her recommendations for toilet training (i'm not a big GF fan but have picked up the odd tip). While I was dipping in it I read the section on moving to a big bed and noticed she is very anti moving oo of cot before 3 unless they're climbing out anyway. I had previously been trying to pursuade DD2 to move into the big bed (as DD1 was in it by this age) but DD2 has been quite resistant and having read GF's logic about reasons not to I have changed my mind and decided to take my lead from her. Basically her reasoning was that if they are hard to settle in a cot they will be even harder in a bed and, more compellingly in my view, it is almost impossible to go back to the cot once moved to the bed. I guess it depends tho if you want to toilet train her at night as well as day then she will need to be able to get up?

"out" not "oo"

Take my lead from DD I meant!

Oh Buzzy thanks for that, that supports exactly my reasons for not moving her into a bed as I have a feeling everything will just get a lot harder and they are hard enough already!

Don't worry about the potty training, things are back to normal this morning as she had a full nappy when I went to take it off and although she sat on the toilet and tried her best nothing happened. She's not going on the toilet at school yet either so I think it will be a while yet. As for night time, I hadn't thought about that as dd1 has never needed to go overnight so it had not occured to me that dd2 would be different. So when you potty train children at night they are expected to get up and go on their own? I had heard about "lifting" but again as we have never had to do this with dd1 I'm hoping we won't have to with dd2 either!

I guess it depends on the child clara. DD1 has never got up in the night either but some probably do. The other thing about staying in a cot is that you probably still use a sleeping bag? Where you'd switch to a blanket in a big bed? Or is it too hot there? We still use light duvets here even tho it's summer as at night it gets down to about 12 degrees.
I have already had problems with DD2 taking her nappy off in the night even though she's still in the sleeping bag - I'm guessing she'd do it much more often if she just had the duvet!
DD2's birthday today and she was very obliging and wore her mermaid outfit I gave her for her birthday for a good 2 hours before she took off the skirt/tail - very cute!
Next week its my Mum's birthday and DD is going to be very surprised to see someone else getting presents - she's so used to receiving them herself now...

Happy New Year everyone!

Well done for making a START on the potty training Clara! I think I may have to in the new year but not looking forward to it despite DD showing definite signs of being ready... She is still in a cot too, I tried the transfer to a bed a few months ago but she then was a nightmare to get to sleep and stay asleep (even in the cot) so I stopped mentioning it and (touch wood) she is fine again. The DSs were both in a bed by 15 months but Evie is still showing no interest either in the bed or in climbing out of the cot so I think I may leave her a little longer.

Great news for your friend BT

I hope DD had a lovely birthday Buzzy! I am ordering a really cute ladybird outfit/dress from ebay for DD for her birthday next week, I'm hoping she'll wear it all day too! I've also got her a lovely sturdy scooter. I was wondering how she will cope with other's getting presents actually, we'll soon see as it's DS2's birthday in a couple of weeks...

Hope everyone has a lovely New Year's Eve this evening (and that you had one last night Buzzy). Here's to 2010! xxx

Happy New Year's Eve!

Have read through but instantly forgotten everything again!

Congrats to your dh BT

Bad news about the driving test skid, bet you'd psyched yourself up for it. Very brave of you to have been learning whilst pg.

Spent xmas at my parents, got back home yesterday. Saw my sister and BIL too but they are moving to Tokyo on Jan 14th for three years

Wow at potty training Clara DS still like sitting on toilet but wont do anything on there! And as for the dry night nappy dd has gone back into night nappies cos there were just too many wet beds. And she still sometimes wets herself just cos she cant be bothered (it was funny when she deliberately pissed all over H's lap on xmas day though )

Re beds, ds was cot refusing and screamng for hours and putting him in the bed made him much better...it was a gamble though!

Great news about Evie's eyes Beckle

Clairey - at your DD wetting herself on her dad's lap lol!

I'm not even thinking about potty training... ds is no where near ready! But best of luck to those who are starting it and do share with us your tips and tricks!

Happy New Year everyone!

Oh and I am now thinking that yes I would like to try for DC2 Not yet though, think I will start taking the folic acid supplements in a couple of months, and then once I have done 3 months on them, we will go for it!

BT more turtlettes. Hurray.

Happy New year to you all! Scarily it's now "this year" that DC3 will be born......

Happy New Year everyone - lots to look forward to this year with several new babies (we expect to be kept informed!).

Clairey - I hope 2010 is good for you and you and your dc's settle into your new life quickly.

ALl I can say is Thank GOD the holidays are nearly over - I get my life back in two days time!

Yay I have tax credits! [phew]

at Clairey (for tax credits) and BT (for the thought of another turtle)

Nothing else to say really, just checking in! Sort of looking forward to the DSs going back to school tomorrow but sort of not either. Will be nice to have a routine back but DD and I will miss them being around and they are always more stressed and tired during term time (and therefore more snappy and grumpy).

seasons greetings everybody.
as usual my best intentions of keeping up with everybody have disappeared under the thick layer of life-dust that seems to accumulate when I'm not looking. muchos respectos to any lo's who will produce the goods on a potty. ours is used as a bath for dolly at the moment. lucky dolly.

i haven't had time to read back through everything that i've missed but will try to do so soon - though as we found out on new years eve that my step-mil has terminal cancer (advanced metastatic pancreatic, for all you amateur oncologists...) things have been a bit weird at marmalade towers. both very busy and very quiet, not sure how that happens but is mighty odd. prognosis v bad (4-6 months max - like that is long enough to be a maximum!) and dd keeps asking to make pictures for 'granny xxx' to make her better which is enough to bring a tear to even my flinty-souled eye. hey ho.

off to check out other mn lists for advice about how to approach my fil, even more flinty-souled than I, to try and help out a bit.