October 2009 babies - Waving arms and gummy smiles make the sleepless nights worthwhile.

[HumphreysCorner]

Here we are on the other side-finally. Well done ladies!

On 2nd lot of AB's and they are suitable for BF so no expressing needed.

HC
x

I slept on the floor of the sitting room and fed Connor at 1am and 5am which is amazing for us.He did wake at 2am but I just let him settle himself, I don't think it took too long !

So sitting room it is for a bit until I make it back to our room (the moniteor works in the sitting room.

The big 3 are out playing in the sunshine and Connor is having a nap.Sadly I need to clear up the lunch things.

I hope you are all having a lovely weekend.

Oh fidelma I hope the floor is not too uncomfy If I were you I think I'd buy a stronger moniter, one that be picked up....is that possible?

Rubyslippers yes thanks, I have felt better towards the end of this week.

I have had a really nice week with dh being home and really feel I have made progress with F sleeping in his crib for day naps. He had a 25 minute and then a 50 minute one today , plus a sleep in the pram round the shops and one in the sling at the park with ds1 and dd.

Am having an M+S 'takeaway' for dinner and will watch 'Take me Out' ,we have really enjoyed it!!!

Didn't say before but glad nathaniel is doing so well

Princessmel, wasnt "take me out" great last night! Was soooo glad that daisy made it at the end lol.....

We are going to put Faith into her own room now, but im a bit nervous about doing it. I think its more for me not wanting to have her away in another room, but she is really noisy & neither of us is getting much sleep with her being beside us Someone please tell me its ok

Just online with next, looking at all the wee girls clothes, i think i could spend a fortune!

Hello everyone! Just catching up with posts. Interesting to see what activities everyone is up too. My neighbour tells me that she's out almost every day so I feel a bit inadequate...!

littlepea I've been thinking about putting William in his own room... However, he wakes to often and I can't be bothered to traipse across the hallway. You'll be ok! Also I love Next and have spent a fortune... Terrible

luxuries - er we have a cleaner, but I think that's a necessity... I've given up chocolate and dairy due to William's reflux but do like the odd lemon danish from waitrose. Yum. Also molton brown bath gel is a nice luxury.

fidelma what monitor do you have? We're in a victorian house with thick walls and the BT 150 works well.

HT I had a similar thing with green poos and found that feeding approach worked really well. However once I switched to the other boob, it's so full that W struggles and chokes then refuses to go back on

scout dont feel guilty about the choc!

I had William on Thursday and he's lost a few ounces in the space of two weeks which is the first time that's happened. I know that it's nothing compared to what others have gone through but it's thrown me a bit... The HV says to come back in a month - but I might go back sooner. His reflux has been quite bad the last two weeks so I assume it's that.

I hope everyone else is getting sleep.

D'oh I had William weighed on Thursday. I blame lack of sleep.

Terrible nights sleep last night tooooooo terrible to mention or either think about.I am going to sleep back in Connors room,although I still think I need to get out

iggle I will look into the monitor but I am not too hopeful as Connor is downstairs and our bedroom is at the opposite end of the house upstairs.Which is also a long way to go at night [sigh]We can't even get phones to work throughout the house or wifi (how do you spell wifi ?)

I should of given up chocolate as today I bit into a large piece of chocolate and broke a huge piece of my tooth off They do say a tooth for every pregnancy, I have at least done that if not 2 teeth and since I have had 4 pregnancies well I wont do the maths !!!!Perhaps I should stop eatting chocolate or perhaps find out who Simon Cowels dentist is !!!

Lovely sunny, exhausting weekend,looking forward to Monday to get a rest

Connors reflux is now almost non existant I think due to solid food.All of mine have been much better when solids have been introduced (well after a few weeks)He had pear and a bit of carrot for breakfast and sweet potatoe and green beans for tea and loads of breast milkWell done to everyone who has held off for longer.I wanted to but he needed some solids (I think)

Hi all, have kind of lost track of the thread a little after a tough week last week looking after my invalids. DH has just gone off to work and Joseph is sleeping on my lap.I feel a bit dazed today,lots of emotional stuff going on in the family that has developed into a full blown feud and isn't going to be resolved any time soon. So thankful that I have Joseph and dh, am concentrating on them now. Am worn out looking after them all last week but they are both on the mend.

I can definatly relate to the difficulty of being away from family, althugh in the present curcumstances it's probably a good thing. Mine are all in Wales, massive Catholic family in a small community, always in and out of each others houses every day. Its very different here, especially for outsiders like myself.

I've almost left this thread several times because I always seem to be moaning-sorry about my constant grumbles. Joe is hard work outside and I'm an outdoors kind of girl but he screams in the pram, buggy, car seat-we went round the park today and he screamed until I picked him up and carried him. Between that and his sleep and bath hating issues, I feel like a right rubbish mother.Speaking of baths-what bath support do you use? I want to make it less scary for him, even on me in the bath he is unhappy. Have come to the conclusion that I have a baby who much preferred the womb to being outside.

Calypso Clever Annalise sitting up on her own! Thanks for the offer of sling help, I may take you up on that. I think the sling could change everything,I just can't seem to get the hang of any of my three and J gets heavier every day.

fidelma Sorry you're having such trouble sleeping and hope you're not too uncomfortable on the floor. For some reason, I always sleep well on the floor, it does wonders for my back. Am reading your weaning updates with interest-not sure we'll make it to the 6 months here. Are you mashing everything up -I'd have loved to have seen Connor eat his green beans! I bought 4 grain organinc baby rice on Saturday (rice, millet, quinoa) but haven't used it yet.Ow on the tooth, hope not too painful.

littlepea good luck putting Faith in her own room, I'm sure she'll be fine.Another next fan here.

Princess Glad you have had a good week and well done on the fab progress you are making with naps.

Bella How is Nathaniels throat? Better I hope.

Iggly I didn't realise you'd given up dairy and chocolate-how are you finding it? I'm on day 2 after taking to La Leche and in an effort to sort out the green explosive nappies. How long was it before you saw a difference? Its not so bad for me because I've done the whole veggie/vegan thing although it's odd not drinking soya milk. I've been pleasantly surprised by Oatly though. I've been reading the allergy threads-didn't realise that bourbon biscuits are dairy free or that I can still have chocolate! (Tesco finest Peruvian apparently).Block feeding is definately helping.

Love to everyone else, I'll try and catch up later.x

HT I have one like this bath support It's great, the simpler the better imo

just marking my place as i need to catch up with you all

needless to say Rubes is sleeping as badly as ever. Think her teeth are really bothering her

Am taking her to be weighed tomorrow ...

hope everyone is doing ok and i will catch up with the thread

xx

I moved Rubes into her own room about 2/3 weeks ago as co-sleeping was making her much more wakeful

She sleeps in a grobag and seems to enjoy the space of the cot

i have to cross a hallway to get to her, but i have got used to it now

i did miss her at first but i sleep better as i don't hear every trump and rustle from her

am very glad we co-slept for as long as we did

fidelma we have trouble with wifi and mobiles but this monitor works all over.

I'm tempted to start on solids as getting quite excited by it. I've got two books - a BLW one and the gina ford one (from SIL).

HT, it took two weeks for a real improvement. I gave up choc as had read it could make reflux worse and I ate loads over xmas so seemed a good reason to do so! Don't miss it much... Well only because DH has been good and not buying any! I really like Oatly milk - it makes a good ovaltine. However, I did read that oats can up your milk production and as I have over-supply (hence block feeding), I've switched to rice milk. Which is grim. I will, however, be buying bourbons to compensate.

I completely understand the screaming - William does this. I put him in the pushchair and he screams, so have to sling him instead which he loves. He also gets upset if I leave him in his chair. However I have noticed that he is getting more hungry which is contributing to the screaming so I've been feeding him a bit more which has made him less grizzly.

HT have you tried a tummy tub bath? It's basically a bucket which you dunk baby in. William loves it as it submerges him up to his shoulders and he can't move much. Although we have been using a bigger bath now as he likes a kick about, but the tummy tub got him used to it and really relaxed him. See here

ruby when will our babies sleep?? #

Hi to all!

iggle going to try your monitor, thanks.

HT I love hearing from you on the thread.I hope that everyone is feeling better.Being a mum is such a huge learning curve.I am still learning every day.(and getting it wrong and sometimes right)It is a tough but amazing journey,we all need to try and remember to enjoy the ride.(by the way I am so exhausted/or at the end of a bug, that my head hurts but I am happy.)

My tooth has been fixed although it will take a little getting used to as it is a slightly different shape.

Connor ended up in bed with me again, not quite sure when it happened.I do like him there however I would like him in his cot more.

Connor has liked the bath the least out of my lot.I usually put him in with one of the others as he likes being held.Or a towel in the bath for him to sit on.He is not mad on lying down.My other 3 all liked a shallow bath so that they could have their heads on the bottom of the bath with the water up to their ears.Much kicking and exercise followed. I hope that makes sense.

Morning all.

ht please dont leave, its a tough ride motherhood.

fidelma Fred comes in with me around 3am every day and feeds on and off until 7!! He goes to bed a 6.30 with a small top up feed around 7ish then dh feeds him a bottle, using the breastflow bottles I found around 10ish then he wakes again around 1am for a feed from me and then has taken to chatting and singing for 40ish minutes, then feeds again around 3, then ends up in bed with me.
He does however nap on the school run around 8.30ish until 9.15ish and then again around 11.30 until 1.30-2pm then on the school run again in the eve.

HT how about bathing him in the kitchen sink? Fred was born in the water so I think that might be why he relaxes so much in the bath.
The nurse wondered about Freds thyroid as he doesnt ever stop moving.....I can feel another active boy coming on....Lord help me.

ruby I wondered if I should move Fred into his own room to see if I can get him out of my bed.. Think we'll try another bottle at night.

Right school run beckons

Morning ladies

HT You are an amazing mummy! I think you are doing much better than I would with Joseph, you have so much patience and love and overcome every hurdle - and you know we ALL come on here for a moan, its why we're here for each other
re: Skype, I'll FB you with my skype name so if you like you can contact me and I'll run through the demo of how to get one of these wraps on, using Annalise as a model

fidelma hope you are comfy with the new tooth shape!

Good luck to all those moving babies out of parents' rooms; Annalise slept by herself for the first time last night, went 11:45pm to 5:30am so that's pretty fab, I think we were waking each other up around 2-3am so relieved for once I don't have to spend an hour shh/patting in the night, yay!
Daytime naps still a pain in the bum though, she SCREAMS for ages before finally giving in and nodding off. Really dom't want it to become a war between us, but I finding progress on this front very slow! Oh well, perseverence and consistency are my new motos.

am also giving the Block Feeding a go, much leakage at first but hopefully engorgement will resolve itself soon and the weight gain will improve.

huh, someone is already awake!
x

calypso what a god night.

Peaches i am also feeding Connor like that through the night.I need to stop but sometimes it is easier to feed

Our water has frozen it is -6 now
I wanted a bath before I go and teach bollywood again,it may be smellywood

Ds1 had a bad night and ended up in with me FGS.As if I don't have enough to deal with during the night.

I am on a big push to try and get my DC to tidy up after themselves more.It is almost more exhausting than just doing the work myself.But hopfully it will be worth it in the long run.

HT-please stay as we like to listen and help. M screams until I pick him up, I beieve this will pass as it will for Joe. When I bath Matthew I don't use supports I lay him down flat in the bath and just hold his head up so his ears are above the water. He, and my DD's when they were babies love it as they are free to kick their legs and wave their arms about. Plus I don't have to support the full weight of M.

Calypso-yay for a good night.

M is still waking twice a night so the feeding from the same side is not helping as I had hoped.

DH has got an £80 fine for not doing a SORN declaration on his wreck of a car he keeps in the garage. Time it went! He never got a reminder though.

Better go as ironing to do.

HC
x

HT - don't go

i highly recommend a book called What Mother's Do Especially when it looks like nothing

if you want, i can post you my copy but I would like it back when you are finished with it

let me know either way and i will do that for you

anyway, no-one moans as much as me! Every post i make has been off on one about Ruby's lack of sleep

fidelma - if you find the secret to getting your kids to tidy up, let me know as DS is rubbish. He used to me great - he enjoys clearing the table and sweeping etc but tidying his toys is a different matter

calypso - yay to annalise sleeping so well - long may it continue

peaches - How are you finding the breastflow bottles? Ruby was taking them (i found them cheap in T K Maxx but now she won't take a bottle at all)

Had ruby weighed and she is just over 14 lbs at 19 weeks. She is following the 25th centile perfectly.

not much planned for today ... am taking advantage of DS being in nursery so that i can do some housework and resting

Hi everyone

calypso glad you had a good night

ht don't go! It wouldn't be the same on here without you

fidelma I find that bribery works well, ha ha ha

peaches your nights sound like very hard work

I had a bad night last night. Amelie was very unsettled she was up on and off from 9.30pm till 12.30 the from 5am till morning also had ds in bed with us around 3am so not much sleeping for me last night. Amelie wasn't hungry when she was up she just seemed very uncomfortable in her tummy, she's fine this morning but has just rewarded me with a huge poo that went absolutely everywhere! on her arms, legs, feet, back, front... so that was probably what was brewing last night I had literally just got her dressed so it must be the quickest clothes change in history

Anyway, sorry I've not been posting much, have been quite busy with the arrangements to start building our new house, there's so much paperwork!! Think it's about done now and the builders are starting clearing the plot on Saturday, which is quite exciting We may also have a buyer for our current house, they're just trying to sort out a mortgage so fingers, toes, and everything else crossed....

have a good day everyone

Hi again.

Just met a friend with her 2 week old ds who is already sleeping better than Fred and only waking once in the night. Its hard not to be jealous.

ruby Im loving the bottles. He looks so comfortable using them he has the same mouth shape as when he breast feeds.

fidelma You just reminded me of something ds2 did the other day. I asked him to tidy his toys (he always gets ds1 to do it!) and I kept on at him until I thought he had. Anyway I said well done good boy etc only to find he had hidden them under the mat in the playroom. Cars action figures etc really made me laugh. We have a hole in the lining of one of the sofas and he had stuffed toys in there too and hidden the lego under the other sofa!!!

Calypso Long may the good nights continue.

twinkle good luck with the house build.

Ruby weighs the same as Matthew but on a boys chart it means he is down to just above the 9th centile.

rwinkle-very exciting. We did a self build and I took lots of photos, great to look at once you are living in it.

Just cut M's nails and he didn't complain this time.

HC
x

I hope no one goes! I know I joined this forum late, but have found it to be a God-send. It's a good place to have a moan or to ask questions I feel too silly to ask in RL.

I have a poorly baby and am an unwell Mommy. Seb woke up with the dreaded cold on Thursday or Friday -- coughing, sneezing, watery eyes, wheezing. He's still a happy chappy. He came with me to our Guide event on Sunday and though I almost backed out because of his cold, I'm glad I didn't. He had such fun being fussed over by everyone from all of the old dears to the Rainbows. In fact, everyone commented on how "good" he was. Are babies really "good" or are just some more content than others?

I found Seb's sleep and fussy issues have more or less cleared themselves up when we started treating his silent reflux. Until then I thought I had one of those unhappy, glass-is-half-empty babies who didn't want to be here. Now he sleeps almost 13 hours at night with just two feeds (though sometimes three or four) and can go the first for his sleep 4-6.5 hours without waking up. He's also sleeping in his basket -- YAY! Need to work on daytime naps in the basket, but as long as he takes a couple of cat naps during the day I'm happy.

I took him to be weighed again on Friday and he's now 14 lbs 8 oz. He's following along nicely just under the 50th percentile but I don't take much notice to that. He's very long and lean and will take after his daddy -- who at 6'5" towers over me. DH has hollow legs and is thin and I was 98 lbs until I was 25 (despite eating anything not nailed down).

Seb uses one of these for his bath: bath sponge. I remembered my parents having them for my brother and sister and tried it with Sebby. He doesn't slip about, can kick and splash to his heart's content, and his back and bum get washed without me having to pick up a slippery baby! When he's sitting he can sit on it and not slide.

Blimey this has been a long one. Think I should go try to find some lunch for myself -- haven't had a proper meal since lunch yesterday so really should force something down.

Hugs to all!

Wanted to ask -- how do you lose a pacifier in a moses basket? Seb had one last night and when I went looking for it at 4 a.m. when he wanted it, it was no where to be found! We have shaken the blanket, the tee-shirt, the mattress and it seems to have disappeared! He thought it was a brillant game, having Mom and Dad "patting him down" at that stupidly-early hour but I was not happy....

Scout-sorry to hear you are both poorly, hope you feel better soon. Has the pacifier rolled under your bed or any furniture? Have to titter at the sponge as I bought one for DD1 and only used it once as it soaked up every bit of water when I used it in the baby bath. Perhaps I should haved tried again in the big bath.

Matthew is once again refusing to let me put him down.

HC
x

ooohhh hc you shouldn't have said that about doing a self build I'll be bombarding you with questions now

water back on,bollywood done, connor asleep in my arms.i should put him down but it is quite lovely and my last baby.

we are also doing a build and refurb this year and then no more.we have just had a poly tunnel put up does that count as a new build fun fun fun.

my tooth is very painful so i am off to the dentist again for root canaloh well it will be oeaceful away from the children