Sept 08: last year they were cute little bundles that smelt of milk and vanilla, but now they've been replaced with a babyzilla!

[ILikeToMoveItMoveIt]

A new thread for us as the last one was running low.

It's not permanent, I totally wouldn't do it if it was. It's tough to explain but I'm only allowed to look after one under 1y/o at a time. As I have an 8m/o starting in May it has taken me out of the game for under 1's until then, unless they only need me for a couple of months. So when this lady asked if I could just look after her son for 2 months I was interested. I did initially tell her no as it's a lot of hours and it's about 15-20min drive to get him, but she's a final year Uni student, she's not English and has no family here not even her partner, the baby doesn't sleep, she's been trying to find a CM for months and I just felt sorry for her, she seemed so knackered and lost. She's bottle feeding him and he was getting her up every 2hrs for a feed . Suffice to say that that's in the middle of being changed!! I've ended up going out of my way to help her I suppose but I can't say that I'm not just slightly motivated by the large fee that she's paying me (£200 a week is a lot when you're used to being a SAHM!) But to answer your question, yes I probably have taken on too much although he's actually a really easy baby, much easier than when DD was that age, easier than she is now too!! .

Unfortunately my mother rubs me up the wrong way nearly every time I meet her but I very very rarely argue with her because there's no point and she holds a grudge for eternity. No one ever stands up to her although she is incredibly unreasonable and overbearing just because it's more hassle than it's worth. Tonight though I just couldn't do it although if it was any other person what I said wouldn't have been needed to be said in the first place, and then they certainly wouldn't have stormed out as it wasn't actually that bad, but she's not used to anyone ever going against her. Bahh, don't get me started!

Sorry to hear about your argument with your mum loli

Hi Ninja

Glad your dd is doing so well

HE is going really well for us at the moment...ds1 is so much more happy and his confidence is returning...to the point where he has joined the local beaver group and started swimming lessons yesterday! (both of which I have been tyring to get him to do for over 18 months!)

School really knocked his confidence and has left him feeling that he has a "stupid brain" just because he couldnt do what this government tells us that kids of his age "should" be doing Ds1 is a summer baby and had significant develpomental delay and I deeply regret not deferring his entry into school (albeit I was told by the head at the time that I couldnt which I have since found out is untrue!)

We have been HE now for 5 weeks and he has completed 5 workbooks already! I have had to go online and order more! and now that he is readig what he wants to read (lots of dr suess and the gruffalo and non fiction animal books) his reading is improving week by week and he now actually asks to read!!!! (becaroo swoons in shock!) The 2 reading schemes that the school used (all aboard and ORT) were dire - I am not surprised he found therm boring.

Dont get me wrong, it was not a bad school - but after my ds's experience I feel that the current system of judging children by the "this by that age" mentality is very damaging to the children who are perhaps nearly a year younger than others in their class. I also think the current system of "funding by results" should have gone out in the victorian era, but dont get me started I could rant on all day!

We have joined 3 local HE groups and he has been on 3 really good workshops already - yesterday he went animal tracking at a local park and mnade a plaster cast of a deer hoof print I still have days when I wonder if I have done the right thing - especially when I see him with his school friends - but he is so much happier I really think it was the right thing to do.

We are so busy next week (can it really be half term already???) - he has been invited to a party by one of his old school friends which I was really touched about and then we are seeing his cousins and some other school friends every day for the rest of the week. The social side of school is the only thing he misses tbh and I am working quite hard to make sure he keeps in touch with his friends.

Sorry to hear of your argument with your mum lolli....I can sympathise! My mum is madder than a box of frogs

Toby is ill AGAIN. Seriously, when is it every going to end????????????????

Becaroo and Muffin - Thank you for your sympathies, I feel a lot better this morning and am back in to my 'well f**k her!' attitude rather than feeling guilty about it! DF came home late last night and I told him about it and he just said that it was my mum through and through, text book stuff from her!

Becaroo - I'm very interested in your HE, DF saw an article or telly program a while ago and got all enthused but the thing with HE is that I assume a parent has always got to be off work, I'm not sure if we could afford that for the duration of DDs education. How did you find out about all the HE stuff going on in your area, it sounds brilliant!

To the mums of ill babies - DD is ill AGAIN too, she is always ill, I bf'd for 54 weeks, I thought it was supposed to do them good?! Someone was describing a strange vomiting bug - DD had exactly the same. She threw up overnight in her cot, then nothing all day but threw up all her undigested tea after her bathtime then nothing until the next afternoon where she had the awful squits which lasted for a few days. She's just got over that and now she's bloody teething and yesterday was truly horrific

Glad to hear you're feeling better about things today lolli, mothers have an amazing way of winding us up don't they? Oh, god, will I be like that???!!!!

Your ds sounds like he's blooming becaroo, and it's due to you. Well done I hope you're very proud of yourself.

I know what you mean about the reading books as well. I used to help my niece and nephew with their reading when they started school and the books were utter tripe. I know an early reading book can't be a ripping yarn, but still, some effort would be good. I heart Dr Seuss too

We seem to have neverending colds here, tis grim and bloody annoying.

We have such teething grizzles here that we have decided to rename DD Griselda. She now answers to it - is that bad?

My sister home eds her children in New Zealand. They seem to be involved in loads of home school activities in their area - art classes, outings, sports days. Their local home school association organises sports teams to play in the local school league and my nephew is a star goalie.

ponymum thank you for educating me on the Sheila's Maid - my parents have two in their house and I want to get one for our utility room once the extension is done, but I didn't know what they were called so couldn't google them. At home we always called them 'the rack over the boiler' and 'the rack over the bath'!

meglet I live without a tumble drier by having low standards! Everyone gets a clean towel on a saturday after they've taken last week's towel swimming, and I only change bed sheets when they've got bodily fluids on them, which sometimes means several weeks between changes! In fact I've just realised that we've only changed our bedsheets twice in the 3 months we've lived here I used to do a nappy wash every other day when ds was little but it can be every 3 or 4 days now. The outlaws are coming up next week to see the new house for the first time, so I'd better give the bathroom its second clean too!

lolli that's lovely what you're doing to help that family out, ignore your mother! But you already know that

Hi guys Happy Valentines day , enjoy your days.
My lovely dh got me a pink pen set , a ball point and fountain from waterman?? Quite strange but cute too I think
Baby e has taken to squarking to let me know what he wants, its really annoying. No words still, I cant wait!
Oh and I tumble! lots

Waterman pens are lovely Mamma, they also do some lovely colour inks. South sea blue is divine and I use the red and green inks when I write my christmas cards. But day to day I use the purple. I think I have an ink fetish! And did you know you can also get fragranced ink?!

We went for a lovely walk in the park this morning and fed the ducks. DS found a huge deep puddle to fall in, luckily he had his all in one waterproof and wellies on. We then waked into town to get a cup of tea and ended up in Greggs And yes we had a sausage roll

For the amazing ladies on here who are not with a partner at the moment, I'm sending you an amazingly huge and warm Valentines Day hug. Yeah it can be a shit day when you're not with someone, but think about how the day would be even shitter if you were still them xxx

Where's Hopefully? She's probaby fainted from all of our confessions of tumble dryer use

Oh shit, have just realised it's pancake day on Tuesday.

I love pancakes but they're such a faff to cook.

Hands up who uses a packet pancake mix??!!!!

ILTMIMI I use sainsburys basics pancake mix, its something ridiculously cheap like 10p. If I'm feeling organised we have pancakes for breakfast and it saves me hauling the scales out of the cupboard to make them. They taste fine IMO.

This thread is getting very 'stepford wife' with all the talk of laundry and fountain pens .

DD is teething too, I think it partially explains her yucky poo over the last month. Cows milk didn't seem to help either so she's back on the horrifically expensive toddler milk for a few weeks until her teeth are through and all the winter bugs are gone.

Has everyones DC's canines come through yet? DD has her incisors and molars but gaps where her canines should be. DS's teeth all came through in 'perfect' order so I'm starting to worry about DD's teeth.

My tips are: Make the batter from scratch the night before and keep it in the fridge so it's ready as soon as you need it. And buy real lemons, not that jiff shite. For years I bought Jiff thinking that that's what you do when you have pancakes, then I had real lemons and realised how much nicer and cheaper they are.

meglet - have you checked to see what the nutritional differences are between toddler milk and other formula? They may not be that different. Then again, isn't formula derived from cows milk anyway? Oh I don't know, I'm waffling but hope I can save you a few quid!

DS sounds like he has the same teeth as your dd. He's got twelve. Four at the top, four at the bottom, then two molars at the bottom and two at the top. I think I can see the incisors underneath the gum, but it's dangerous work trying to get your finger in his mouth and have a look.

Hi lolli

Got to dash off to PIL now for lunch but will try to post later re: HE.

Thanks for your lovely comment ILTMIMI

xx

Right, I'm back!

Back when we were considering HE I contacted Education Otherwise (education otherwise.org) its £25 a year for membership and you get a quarterly newsletter and a local contact list which I have found incredibly useful - ds1 now goes to 2 workshops run by people I contacted from the list. They have been very helpful, answering e mails and phone calls etc

There is also the Home Education Advisory Service (HEAS) which produces a very useful resources guide.

Freedom in Edcation is another site and there are yahoo groups for home educators too - google for your nearest one.

Depending on where you live in the country you could be out doing activities/trips/workshops every day! If you live in a very remote location it might be a bit harder to meet other HEers.

There is no one way to HE. Some people do "school at home, other do no structured work at all (autonomous learning)...I do a part structured part autonomous plan with ds1 which is working well. It doesnt have to cost alot of money (particularly if you go down the autonomous route). I have bought KS1 workbooks, excerise books, and art materials but tbh I had a lot of stuff here at home anyway.

I would also really recommend some books if you are really interested in HE;

Free range education by Terri Dowty
How children Learn By John Holt
One to one by Gareth Lewis
An apprenticeship guide to reading by Liz waterland

I have some of these titles myself and would be happy to post them to you to read if you post them back when you have finsihed.

There are also some good vidoes on youtube...type in education is not compulsory.

Its definately worth some research and background reading if its something you think you want to do.

xxx

Becaroo - Thank you so much for all that info, I'll definitely take a look.

Meglet - DD has the four front teeth on top and bottom and one big back one on top. A little boy I mind who is 2 months younger than our Sept babies has nearly a whole mouthful but he has a gap between his very back teeth and his front four iykwim.

Hello everyone! Apologies for the long absence - T and I have been alternating one illness and another for what feels like forever. I got to spend the weekend in a proper fevered state on the sofa, but am feeling a little bit better today.

T is still not walking... I keep vaguely wondering whether I should take him to the HV, but he seems perfectly happy and he is developing, just very slowly (as in, he is more mobile and well balanced now than he was 2 weeks ago, but still nowhere near walking independently). He's generally an incredibly late developer (except when it comes to eating. Eating he is good at), no real words yet, but he does seem to be hitting milestones, just really late. I've had so many people worry on my behalf about T that I'm beginning to wonder if I should be more worried, iykwim. Any thoughts?!

Oh, and congrats Debs! I am of all these small age gaps. I really wanted it to be as close to 2 years as possible, and now I wish we'd started TTC earlier. Ah well, hopefully it will happen this month. I have recently caught myself thinking it would be nice to have 3 . DP is mildly horrified! Guess we'll see how the newborn stage goes with the next one and decide then.

Hey all, finally managing to post today after lurking for ages! Not feeling v motivated today as HR have announced a new car policy which means I end up with a crappy 1.6 rather than the 2.0l I have been driving. I haven't driven a 1.6 since I was in my early 20s! As I do 30,000+ miles a year, am a bit hacked off.

But...then I remember all the people struggling who would be glad of any company car atm, and so i think I should just vent and shut up.

Lolli you have my sympathy over your mum. My mum is "C's nana", not my mum. After therapy and talking it through with my sister, we decided that my mum did her best with us but sadly it just was not good enough emotional care for children.
Having had C, I try to understand her better but, like yours, know she is a toxic mum and try not to feel too guilty.

Congrats Debs75 - amazing. DP and I are agonizing over No2 atm. I really want to have a go and there's never a good time - we should just go with it and take on some of your positive attitude!

Hopefully don't worry about T, he'll get there in his own time. If it helps, C only started walking on her own about 3 weeks ago and cos she was later than other babies, she has progressed very swiftly. Whereas other babies took months to go from a few wobbly steps to confident walking (if they started around 9 months), she took a few wobbly steps 3 weeks ago and is practically running now, although needs to build confidence.

What do you guys do about walking on concrete? C is still a bit wobbly and falls over - took her to the zoo and used reins yesterday but she still tried to crawl on concrete as she felt a bit nervous and I feel bad that she's going to fall on concrete and badly hurt herself - her balance is not very good. Do I just let her go and see what happens? She often refuses to hold my hand.

As to teeth, we have 8 front teeth and 2 molars either side - 12 in total. My neice took until she was 2.5 to get all of hers

IMO DD is not wobbly at all and can run really quite fast (trying to keep up with her big bro) so I just let her get on with it. She will not hold my hand either! We have a really battle in the evenings if DH picks us up as she wants to walk to the car and get in herself but of course can't as it's too dangerous. She goes mad when I pick her up and throws herself on the floor.

As for teeth she's got quite a few but won't let me check how many. She's so strong willed!

sunshine no idea where the idea of 'terrible twos' came from - C can throw absolute humdingers at 16m!
Like your DD, she is becoming very strong-willed and independent but C lacks the physical & 'common-sense'skills that go along with that. She throws herself to the floor screaming and I have become one of the mums that I used to look at and think (pre c, or BC as we like to say!) 'gosh, can't they control that child?!' .

I have to admit that, whilst I adore her and would never change her, there are days when she is just exhausting as she is still very needy - by that I mean someone must contantly play with her or interact with her or she gets very frustrated. But at the same time, she wants to be indpendent, but with me or her dad watching her.
All she wants to do atm is to be read to, which is lovely, but difficult when you're trying to get dressed or put a wash on.
That's probably why nana is a hit and mummy isn't! nana can do all her other stuff once C's gone home.

DD has been throwing God awful tantrums for the last month or so, she screams her head off if you don't do something instantly and she throws herself on the floor too, nightmare. I have told DF that we are to totally ignore her when she's throwing a paddy as we tend to just give her what she wants which of course just reinforces her awful behaviour. She can be the most lovely little thing (she's currently dressing up her favourite doll in one of my beaded necklaces!) but she can also be the devil and it'll turn from one to the other in a second.

Oh, and she cried constantly without even taking a breath, for 65 minutes earlier - awful horrible bloody teeth!

I would second whoever said that later walkers take less time. DD started pushing her walker at ahout 8 months but didn't start walking on her own until 11 months, her friend didn't start walking until about 14 months and he went from rubbish to perfect in about 3 weeks.

DD started walking earlier than all her friends but I think she's the slowest to talk, she hasn't really got any words either, just mummy, daddy, bye, hi, there and eyes!! She doesn't shut up all day but she's not speaking proper words just babbling away.

Yes terible twos have definitely started early in the Sunshine household.

ah yes....tantrums

Toby has been having proper throwing himself down on the carpet screaming tantrums for what seems like months now. Cant really remember ds1 doing that but then they are very different children.

As to how I deal with him when he has a tantrum.....Ignore, ignore, ignore. Hard, but it really works.

Toby has...18 teeth!!!! DS1 only had 8 at 18 months!! (He used to get really ill every time he teethed too) Only 2 more to go thank god!

hopefully T will get there.... no point REALLY worrying til he is 2 tbh. Children vary so wildly in their gross motor develeopment (i.e. walking) If he is happy, healthy and alert, he will get there when he is good and ready.

Hopefully, I'd say his fine. I'm sure that you'd have a gut feeling if there was a problem. Saying that you could always post on here and get a lot of people reassuring you that their child was exactly the same. IME the children that walked late don't show any differences at 2 and didn't you say that one/both of you were late walkers?

becaroo that's really interesting, it's so good that your son is so much more settled and progressing. I'm impressed with what he's reading considering you had concerns about him.

I did think about all kinds of options last year, but DD seems so loyal to the idea of school, friends and her teacher - it's just the work.... I still have issues over how they put them on tables according to just their literacy, so she's getting maths work which is way beneath her, but in general I think she's a lot ahppier now. Saying that we had a week when she cried every day at school, but I think if I tried to do any work with her it'd be more frequent than that.

Imo Charlotte sounds like my dd1, she wanted lots of attention and was certainly exausting (except dd1 didn't sleep either ). Saying that now she'll go up to her room and play with her dolls for ages! I know the feeling about books, we're going away skiing on Thursday and I think the only toys that I'm putting in for M is books.

hopefully if you can't be bothered posting your own thread - just read this one

(probably loads of others, but it's the first one I saw)

ninja Before we took Tom out I had repeatedly told his teacher that he was finding the homework (homework for a 6 year old!!! ridiculous!!) too easy. He needed no help,from me at all on the numeracy and just need me to tell him what the spellings were so he could write them down but she just wasnt interested. He was finding phonics too easy too but I dont think they like to mve them from their ability groups whether the child is progressing or not

Sorry to hear your dd was upset Its heartbreaking isnt it? but can I ask if you do any work at home with her now? ie. homework, work for fun i.e. making cards (literacy and art!!) Does she enjoy doing work with you or your dh?

I worried Tom would play up because its me teaching him but hes been great and we only spend about 1.5 hours a day on structured work anyway...he get so much more done than he would in school. On the downside its costing me a fortune in workbooks!!!