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2007-11-30 - 11.30pm previous entry next entry
Big update, lots of photos!
Soooo many photos to post! And I have STILL only resized 42 out of 52 photos (!!) from Arthur's birthday! I am so annoyed with myself that it's the last day of November and I haven't got round to posting an entry here about his birthday in the same month as his birthday! Tsk. But I do plan to.
In the meantime, I have a bazillion other photos that are finally uploaded and ready to go! Also a bit of time to jot down some sweet things about the boys and such. And I must update on general life and so on.
Neil is still out of work. He has had 2 job interviews (nothing came from them) and has another on Monday afternoon in London. So far they are all in London. We're not thrilled about him getting a job in London but they pay well and he can commute pretty easily because we live in Greater London, so... Definitely not for the long-haul though. He has also applied for a job a couple of counties away, and another right on our doorstep where we live. They all pay well enough for us to live comfortably so any of them would be GREAT! He has also had a meeting with one of the leaders at church to discuss our new link (at church) with a church in Ghana. He is really feeling drawn towards work overseas with the church. Which scares. me. silly! It's SO out of my comfort zone and SO the exact opposite of what I would ever want to do! But we will pray and see. He is also open to the idea of some church work in South Africa, as this particular church leader has done a lot of work there and has links, etc. He could easily put Neil in touch with churches out there.
God needs to seeeeriously change my heart for me to be happy about any of this in any way, shape or form! Which would be a GOOD thing, because it's just my comfort-zone issue, and my personality type, that's keeping me from happily embracing what might be God's calling in Neil's life. I am a set-down-roots type of person, and just want to stay where I am and breed! ;) I really don't want to go even another TOWN away, let alone to another country/continent/culture with my babies, a million squillion miles from anyone I ever knew and all my family. Urrrgh. But if God says go... And if Neil says go, for that matter.... Because I am trying to embrace the fact that he's the spiritual leader of our family/household, and I want to submit to him in these things. Submitting is not part of my blueprint! ;) So it will take a lot of work for me. We are praying about it a lot. And meanwhile, Neil is doing the hugely reassuring task of interviewing for DULL jobs in our local area! ;)
My mummy sent us �500 for groceries! Bless her heart! I love her so. They are so supportive all the time, and never condemn or judge us for our decisions. I still feel absolutely remarkably unphazed about money, and Neil too. We have none, but everything is going to be fiiiine, and in fact there's a strange rose-tinted look to everything all the time, even without any money or income. God is good to us!
Also recently muchly prayed-about here is the subject of our children's education. It's too lengthy and stuff to go into in this entry (which I am trying to be brief and efficient with!), but remind me to post an entry SOON entitled, "We are sooooooo going to homeschool!" or something like that! I will have a lot of links to post in that entry. I have absolutely NO doubts in my mind or heart now that homeschooling is the best option for our family. I was starting to be concerned about Arthur's socialization, but really I just needed to remind myself of a few WELL-researched articles on the subject which do away with the myth of homeschooling getting in the way of a child's socialization, and research ways to socialise if we homeschool. I have my methods sorted out, but I'll write about them in another entry. Neil is on board (he was getting iffy about it before) and it's just SUCH a relief. Also a mounting dread because of people who will NOT be supportive finding out sooner or later. Urgh. But that's for another entry.
Matthew is saying so many words! Many of them are only understandable to us though, with his sweet way of pronouncing them! He has also started to say two-word "sentences", the first of which was "Bah, Ah-yah!" (bye, Arthur - waving). He now says "bah" (always with the cute waving) to everyone and everything when they go anywhere, including TV programmes when they finish, and food when it's about to be wiped off his highchair tray! He also says, "bee-bip!" which is his way of saying "excuse me please", hehe! This is, of course, his pronounciation of "beep beep". If he comes up to something in his way like a toy garage or something in front of the bookshelf, he'll give it an impatient look and say, "bee-bip!" and do a little sort of impatient bounce at the knees till we move it for him. The other day Neil opened the stair gate at the bottom of the stairs for Matthew to go up with him to have a bath. I was sitting near the gate on the floor, and he came to me and said, "Mi-mi (he also says, "di-di" for Daddy), bee-bip!" Funny little boy!
He still says "Ah-yah" allll the time, and lately it has taken on a much more adoring tone :) He just looooves Arthur so so much!
Arthur is doing great too. He talks non stop. And I think it's worth emphasizing: He talks non stop! I don't think there are things he can't say or pronounce, except maybe concepts that he isn't old enough to grasp yet. He sometimes still surprises me with things he says, that I don't expect to hear for whatever reason. If something scares him, he'll tell me, "I was dweadbully fwightened!", and the day before yesterday when he got home from the park with Matthew and Neil, I asked him what the weather had been like. He said, "Well, it was very cold and blust-ree, but it didn't rain." I just didn't expect blustery! I thought he'd just say windy or something. He also describes the weather or windows of cars as "mistry" (misty) and has such a wide range of similar descriptive vocabulary, which he uses a lot.
He can count with ease to 10, no longer reciting but counting how many of something is on a page. He is super helpful with all small children. We were at Fellowship Group yesterday and he's now the oldest child by about a year. Most of the little ones there are Matthew's age or younger, and there's one little girl who just turned two. And Arthur! He sat and "read" books most of the time, and played with toys, but he is thoughtful of the little ones at all times. He went and closed the door at one point, and when I asked him if he was okay, he told me, "I shut the door so that the little ones don't get out." Which was soooo thoughtful of him, as one of us parent-y people had forgotten to shut it, and it WAS an issue that the little ones could escape to other (less baby-proofed) parts of this lady's house. Later, one of the toddlers got hold of a balloon and after a while I saw Arthur holding it, standing next to the little one, and heard him saying gently, "Now, you have to be careful with these. You don't want to make them go bang." in SUCH a grown-up caring tone :)
He has lately been surprising us with his memory. He seems to have an excellent visual memory for things. He will cut out 30 car pictures from a magazine with Neil, and if one is missing at the tidy-away stage, he won't rest till he finds out where the "small blue car" went. I have no specific recollection of a small blue car, but maybe it was just that much more interesting to him so he remembered them all? Anyway, he was right, of course. It was under a sofa cushion. He remembers amazing details about cars.
Last week we had just finished getting the boys ready for bed, and Matthew was about to go with me to his room for milky (a breastfeed) and sleep. Arthur got one of his Topsy and Tim books (the boy LOVES those books) and said Matthew couldn't go before story time. So I said, "Why don't YOU read a story to Matthew, Arthur?" as it's something Neil or I do normally. He was SO pleased! He sat down next to Matthew (who did not keep still and stick around for the whole story, by the way!) and opened the first page, and proceeded to "read" the entire book almost word perfectly, phrasing and intonation pretty near perfect as well! Some of the sentences were quite complicated for him to remember, as he's only had the books for a few weeks (since the week before his birthday) and doesn't read one every night, so we thought he'd simplify or miss out some of those sentences. But nope. Every time he nailed one perfectly, Neil and I would look at each other and drop our jaws! And then look back to him and say what a great job he was doing in between pages. I couldn't believe how accurately he had memorised such a long book (for a little one, that is) so quickly, and the complicated sentences too! If he forgot a sentence on a page, as soon as he turned to the next page, he seemed to realise he'd missed something, go back to the previous page, and recite the sentence he'd missed before turning over again.
When I told my mum this on the phone the other day, she said it sounded to her like he was pretty much ready to start reading. I said, "What?!" (he's only just 3!) but she reminded me that he's ever so like me, and I was reading by the time I started nursery school, which must have been around Arthur's age, since he's now "nursery-starting age". The weird thing is, nobody taught me to read. My mum thought nursery taught me, and nursery thought Mummy taught me, and when they got together for a parents evening after I'd been there a month, they discovered that I had taught myself. Since Mummy didn't know about it, she can't be sure HOW, but she said I was doing the same kind of thing that Arthur's doing, and she just had books around the house with simple short sentences (very early readers I guess) which she guesses I started to associate the words on the page with the words she was vocalising as she was saying them. And she read to me a lot, and stuff. She was purposely waiting till I was 5 and starting school to do actual learning-to-read with me, because she was anxious about being pushy when I was too little.
So, I don't intend to "teach" Arthur to read either. I will have the same stuff around the house that my own mother had for me, and though I can't imagine how it could happen this way, Mummy thinks he might well pick up reading by himself. We'll see. I'm in no hurry, and I love to encourage him and see him develop as his own motivation and enthusiasm leads him, so it should be fun either way, even if it's years before he starts to read yet. I read yesterday at one of the homeschooling sites I was researching at, that sometimes exceptionally bright children learn to read by word recognition like that and do it by themselves at a young age. So that reassures me that it's possible, and okay to let that happen if it does. I debated over whether to write that bit here because it sounds HORRIBLY egotistical of me, writing the phrase "exceptionally bright" in reference to a) my own child, and b) me! ;) But though it's got to be grating on someone's nerves as they read this, I guess I am just genuinely sounding thoughts out. I was an exceptionally bright child (note the reference to CHILD and not person in the present tense, haha! My brain is seriously not what it used to be, these days!), actually assessed to be a gifted child, which was apparently hereditary, so it is a genuine concern for me that I am aware of the same possibility for my own children. Arthur is uncannily like me (I do mean uncannily, it's so exact in so many ways!) in personality, energy and ability, as a toddler. I am desperate to handle things differently to the way "things" were handled when I was a child. The fact that I was bright lead to a miserable school-life for me, and basically a rejection of said brightness on my part. I have to make sure that I don't make the same mistakes with my little ones if they turn out to be bright sparks. I know every child is different (and every school, but that won't be an issue if we're homeschooling anyway).
Anyway - more long-winded that it was meant to be! Arthur is just Arthur. He's not one of these toddlers doing 200 piece jigsaw puzzles or anything! He's just a normal boy bean :) But he's bright and I want to help him to flourish and maintain his zest for life and learning the best way I can. I don't want to squash such an exquisite flower as it is just opening :)
I hope that all didn't come across as horribly proud or anything. I cringe at the thought! I always just lay my thoughts and feelings bare here, and of COURSE I am going to think the sun shines especially radiantly out of my own children's bottoms ;) It's only natural! Hehe!
Okay, onto something else. Photos, I think!
My tiny boy (well, the middle-sized boy, not the tiniest of them!) is still breastfeeding before his nap and bedtime, and on waking in the morning. I think I can now say I have successfully night-weaned, and it was completely trauma-free, so that's a HUGE relief! I need the nights sorted because I'm not someone who can manage to tandem nurse at night, though I am happy (excited, even!) to do so in the day. Arthur is still breastfeeding too, same as before, mainly the before-bed session, but any other time of day when he asks and it's convenient to do so. Which is about two or three times usually. Matthew probably wouldn't ask in the day during play time, as Arthur does, but if he sees Arthur nursing he never fails to come toddling over, saying, "Mih! Mih!" (milk?) and clambering up eagerly to have some from the other breast. I love nursing them together. They never nurse for very long that way, especially Matthew who pops right off again after about 60 seconds, but I do love looking down at their sweet little selves tucked into my sides as they sit either side of me, nursing away whilst they gaze at each other across my breasts. And even more lovely is the fact that in between their little persons is a pretty huge bump which houses another little one of mine! I just love moments where ALL my little ones are tucked into me, touching base and keeping that baby bond with me going.
Matthew nurses TO SLEEP at naptime, which ideally needs to change! I definitely want this to be different before Nathan is born, as it will make life soooo much easier, but I still LOVE nursing little ones to sleep. Matthew gets very cross if he isn't nursed to sleep for nap time, but he is fine about the bedtime routine where he breastfeeds, climbs onto me when I sit up afterwards, has a drink of water, and then I rock him and pray over him before laying him in his cot WIDE awake. I then walk away! I take an age rocking him and talking softly in his ear though. I always tell him how much I love him, how special he is, what things he's done today that I have loved seeing/hearing, and how proud I am of him, etc. I hold him out from me to kiss his little lips and face, and then I lay him in the cot and stroke his hair for a while, telling him I love him and he's going to have a lovely sleep, etc. Then I leave the room! And he goes to sleep! This is NEW as of last week. We did the Supernanny Sleep Separation Technique with him, and for 3 nights (not the same 3 in a row - he would do a few nights fine and then have a bad one) at bedtime he basically cried it out. Which SUCKED. I hated it so. Two of those nights we were right where he could see us, just refusing to engage with him or pick him up. He cried for maybe 30-40 minutes and then suddenly settled down and went quietly to sleep. We have gradually edged our way out of his room, so now we're on the landing and he can't see us, but he's fine. Tonight we just came downstairs, straight from his room! No problems.
We got desperate, because he HAS to be independently going to sleep before Nathan arrives. It will be too hard to handle otherwise, I think. We tried a few other methods where we stuck closer to him and responded to him more, and just didn't see much progress over a few weeks, so we switched to a more desperate method. I hated it when he cried, but I'm glad we did the Supernanny Method rather than leave him to cry without knowing where we were. And SO glad he's adjusted and going to sleep well on his own now. Arthur often breastfeeds to sleep at bedtime but he's doing SO well at going to sleep without fuss on his own. He doesn't even get off the bed, just lays down where we tell him and scrunches his eyes shut and waits to fall asleep. He doesn't mind us leaving. So those things are a HUGE weight off for me! Now if only Matthew would sleep through the night.... He doesn't breastfeed at night but he still wakes and requires "settling". Urgh.
Anyway. So he breastfeeds to sleep for his afternoon nap, which I actually LOVE, even though I'm going to wish I'd stopped doing that once Nathan arrives! Matthew lately HAS to be clutching toy cars when he nurses to sleep! Funny boy! He will not come upstairs until he has selected the specific cars he wants to take up with him. I'm sure he'd take the whole lot if he could, but he can only fit one in each hand ;) His favourite car right now is a large Matchbox-style police car, which is battered and missing parts, but he is so attached to it! He will not let me prise cars out of his hands as he's dozing off on the breast - he just clutches harder in a mini-panic! It's not remotely comfortable breastfeeding with a toy car jammed into the underside of my breast! But he's just so adorable to me when I watch him, that I can't help but let him anyway :)
Neil took photos about a week ago. Here's my tiny boy nursing to sleep (almost there, by the looks of things!) in my bed before his nap, with his beloved police car. See my bump! I'm having a BABY! Hehe! I'm so excited :) Also, I love how Matthew always likes to lay his hand on my bump when he's breastfeeding. He's soooo gentle with it too. *sigh*
Here's the end result, lol! Still clutching the police car! I did take it from him without trouble after the photo was taken :) He's always totally unconscious after nursing to sleep. Toootally.
Such a sweetie-pea-pickle! I just love him soooo.
What other photos do I have waiting to share here? I have to check photobucket to see - I think some of them are quite old! Ohhh yes, I have a bunch of photos of Arthur from about a month ago - before Neil was unemployed we bought a cot for Nathan on eBay. We figured we had to buy another cot, or else a toddler bed for Matthew. But in the end we chose to buy a cot for Nathan because Matthew isn't ready to move into a big boy bed yet. We COULD do it, but he just seems so little yet. His is a cotbed, so it converts to a toddler bed, but I don't think he's even ready for that. I think we'll keep him in his own familiar bed, whether it's in cot form or toddler bed form, and Nathan can have his own cot from the start. Nathan's is a regular cot though, not a cotbed, so it's smaller. That's fine. By the time Nathan is ready for a toddler bed (hopefully I'll be pregnant again, wheeee!) Matthew will be FINE to move into a normal bed, or bunks with Arthur, and Nathan can have the toddler bed version of Matthew's cotbed, while baby #4 (BOY #4, let's face it!) has Nathan's cot. So there we go! I bid on a barely used (baby co-slept) cot at eBay in a simple design that I really liked, and it's a John Lewis one, and I love their stuff - really sturdy, and good quality, etc. And won!
It arrived in the most ENORMOUS box, flat packed in big sheets of solid polystyrene. We opened it when Matthew went for his nap one afternoon, since he would be a bit of a nightmare with all the packaging! It meant some quality time with Arthur on his own, as he was HIGHLY excited about opening the huge package! He got right in after we lifted the cot parts out, and proceeded to have the most wonderful hour with the polystyrene, making "snow" and being a digger and all sorts of other fun stuff! It was like a big sandbox because of the sides, and it was lovely to just watch him have fun in that space for so long! He did help clean up at the end. I took a bunch of photos, so here are some (okay, lots!) of them:
By the way, is anybody else having HUGE issues with loading Photobucket images? It's driving me crazy, and it's been a month or two now. It's getting slower for me all the time, and now I can't view them at all on my own diary. And the photobucket website itself is very sluggish for me. It takes an age to upload pictures because I have to keep on quitting and reopening the website, as it's sooooo slow that it doesn't do anything for too long. YouTube is the same for me and has been for ages, but I wondered if it's the same for everyone, or just me? We have broadband so I feel like it should NOT be the case that anything is this slow! Anyone else's photobucket images take forever to load as well, not just mine. And it's the same on my laptop as well as the main computer. So, is this just what everyone else is finding? If so, I apologise that this page will take forever to load with all these photos and blinkies on it!
Right, it's getting late and I'm tired so I must finish off this entry. A few more photos though! :)
Some mornings when the boys get up, they are wide awake and raring to go, and they get stuck in straight away with toys and lively games, etc. Occasionally it's early and they are super sleepy, but still wanting to get up. On these occasions, Neil usually puts the TV on for them and they wake up more gradually to some CBeebies or Milkshake for a bit before breakfast. He took a couple of sweet photos of them a week or two ago, on one such morning. They look soooooooooo sleepy! They were sitting in the laundry basket watching TV with such dopey expressions! I don't know why but I just loved this photo. There's another from behind them. The quality is weird and fuzzy because our camera is dying a slow death or something. Tsk. It is getting worse all the time with blurry images and doesn't deal well with lower light settings. Anyway, here are my sweet sleepy boys in their fleece sleepsuits that we got them for the chilly nights we're now having!
And here are a few random photos of Matthew's usual casual thing - wrestling Arthur by locking him with his body over Arthur's neck/head! They now do this SO frequently that they kind of just get on with other things at the same time, hehe! Arthur is never perturbed by these things any more, they're so commonplace!
And finally, here is Matthew after lunch the other day - they had marmite sandwiches and ham and cheese, and stuff, but they often like a chocolate spread sandwich for dessert (and then yoghurt, and then raisins, and then gingerbread men - they eat a lot of lunch!). That particular day I used the last of the Nutella in their chocolate spread sandwich, and had the empty jar on the table. Matthew finished his sandwich and starting making urgent sounds and motioning for the jar! I explained that it was empty, and gave it to him to examine. Here are the resulting photos :)
He's the cutest boo! I am just constantly commenting (to myself or Neil) on how CUTE that boy is these days, things he says or does, or expressions he makes at us! He just seems to me to be at SUCH a cute age right now. I love his age! I can't believe he's nearly 18 months old! One-and-a-half! It's also slightly scary that it means I must be nearly due another baby because that's the age my little ones tend to get to by the time I am about to have another baby! But exciting too. I can't wait to post photos of all three of my little boys here. It seems surreal that it will even happen, but it will, and it's so exciting! :)
Okay, I must go to bed. After I eat some cereal. And do my FlyLady bedtime routine! And probably eat something else. I eat a lot at the moment! But it's all for a good cause :)
Recent entries.....
Moving time... - 2009-01-04
Christmas Eve! - 2008-12-24
Long-overdue update, a few Nathey pics and a video clip :) - 2008-12-01
Lots of news! - 2008-11-03
Nathan at 8 months... - 2008-10-12