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2006-08-20 - 10.49pm previous entry next entry
Big catch-up (part one!) with photos :)
I'm BACK!!!! :) Yay! Well, for about 5 minutes, as this is the first real opportunity I seem to have had to update my diary for WEEKS and it'll be over when Neil and the boys get home from the park. It's raining. I hope it hasn't turned into a horrible outing for them all! Matthew hates outings, whether he's in the car, sling, pushchair, whatever. He just seems to hate it and cries, so that makes it no fun for the parent who is taking them out, and not much fun for Arthur either really. But hey ho, we persevere! Arthur has to go out, and at the moment I feel like I will go CRAZY if I don't get some time alone in the house without noise or impending responsibility, etc. Even an hour is nice, and they've been gone that long now so I think they'll be home soon.
Matthew sleeps next to where the computer is and we just can't figure out an alternative place to put it so we are not getting on the computer much at all any more :( I am seriously going crazy with how much I miss my Diaryland friends!!!! And my Fertility Friend buddies too. I want to just browwwse diaries like I used to and keep up with the lives of people I know and love here at Diaryland. I can't remember the last time I signed anyone's guestbook, but now I don't even know what's happening in anyone's lives! I hope you guys are all doing well. I promise I'll try to catch up soon. I WILL find a way to use the computer, hehe! Most of all I miss updating my diary when I feel like it, and when I have a backlog of photos or newsy stuff to write about Arthur or Matthew. Or just my thoughts. I do sometimes get online to check eBay or emails and messages and stuff, but it's the clattery typing of a 2-hour diary entry that isn't fair to Matthew while he's asleep for the night. Neil misses his horrible shoot-em-up game too. We are really trying to figure out a way to change this!
I used the last HOUR updating my blinkies - yes, I am still horribly addicted to them, hehe! I'm so sorry about the vast amount of them flashing away at your poor eyes, lol! I got rid of some old ones. I am not co-sleeping with Matthew right now, but the way things are at the moment is that Arthur still co-sleeps with Neil (while I do "night duty" with Matthew!) so I kept that blinkie. I can't find a breastfeeding milestone blinkie for Arthur's current age so the latest one (18 months) still stands. I have a TWO YEAR one all ready to use though! :) I hope we make it! I'm pretty sure we will.
Okay so now that the blinkies are all updated, I can start the mammoth task of catching up with news about the boys and life in general, and of course all the millions of photos! Fortunately for my diary, I haven't had time to take as many photos as I would normally have liked, so there aren't TOO many to post all at once! Still quite a few though!
Well! I can't believe summer is nearly over and we're into the second half of August already!!! It just went by in a flash. Neil and I celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary on August 14th :) Matthew turned two months old the same day. HOW have two months gone by since I gave birth?!?!! He is 9 and a half weeks old now. Crazy.
Arthur is 21 months old and now that autumn seems to be approaching, it's rather freaking me out because the end of autumn marks Arthur's birthday, and I seriously, SERIOUSLY cannot fathom having a two-year-old! It seems crazy to me. Two is soooo.... not a baby anymore, in any sense of the word! It's so "little boy" and grown up. I can't believe he's going to be two in a matter of a few months. BUT I feel excited and proud to be able to say that I am a mummy to a two-year-old! Though I'll miss being able to say that I have two children under the age of two. Which is a weird concept in itself to me! All these milestones are just whizzing by and being snatched from under my nose just as I'm pausing to inhale their sweet fragrance, they are just passing SO fast! I feel sad about that but then the next stage is always so exciting that I can't stay sad for long because I am too eager to embrace what comes next!
I had my 8-week postnatal check with the Health Visitor last week and it went fine. I did the Postnatal Depression Screen and scored 8, which is "nice and low" apparently. I scored 7 with Arthur, I think, about the same. So that's good. I don't feel depressed, and I'm coping better and better all the time with two demanding little ones! Though there are always going to be good days and bad days, days that flow wonderfully and make me feel like SuperMummy, and days that are just HIDEOUS and I can't imagine how I got through them. I think that is normal motherhood for you though! And I'm adjusting to that and accepting it, so that helps.
Okay, some photos! Then if I have time after that I'll write some more newsy stuff. If the boys get home, I'll maybe save this and try a little clattering-keyboard session this evening, but not for too long in case I disturb Matthew too much. He pretty much sleeps when we attempt to use the computer but he stirs more and I feel bad about invading his sleeping space anyway.
So here are some sweet photos of my lil boys with their Daddy. Matthew was 7 weeks and 4 days old when these were taken, so I guess it's been a couple of weeks (ALREADY!) since then. Neil was trying to get Matthew to smile at him - which is NOT a difficult thing these days, that boy is just like his brother and smiles and smiles and smiles at just anyone! He's such a sweetie :) In the first photo, Matthew was "talking" to Neil, another thing he likes to do a LOT! Arthur was looking a little put out in the second photo but he was actually just fiddling with something on his fingers. In any case, Neil was telling Matthew how scrummy he was and then turned to Arthur and gave him a huge hug and a kiss and told him he was lovely too :) And then Arthur wanted to kiss Matthew (he does this a LOT), so they're sweet photos :)
Arthur is still doing great with Matthew. He doesn't ever show any jealousy towards him, and the only times he even shows the tiniest bit of frustration is when he really wants to breastfeed, or for me to do something for him and I am feeding Matthew or trying to burp him or settle him if he's crying a lot. Then he will pat the bouncy chair and say, "Dair" or pat the changing mat on the floor and say, "Nat!" and then, "Ma-Ma" (his word for Matthew), which is his way of telling me he wants me to put Matthew down in the chair or on the mat so I can attend to Arthur for a while! If I can't do that right at that moment then he gets cross or whiney, but how long that lasts depends on how tired he is or what kind of mood he's in. If he's tired and cranky it can turn into a tantrum but otherwise just a moan for a few seconds before moving onto something else.
Sometimes I have to tell him to wait when I am breastfeeding Matthew and Arthur wants to join in. If I have Matthew across my body then it's too fiddly for me to latch Arthur on the other side. I CAN do it, but lately I am telling him he needs to wait a moment till Matthew is finished. It's easier for me that way and Arthur CAN wait. If I know they both want to breastfeed at the same time and I haven't started with either of them yet, then I'll set it up so that they can both nurse. I put a pile of pillows by my side and lay Matthew on those so he's in a sort of football hold under my arm, but on the pillows instead of held in my arm. Then I latch him on and Arthur has plenty of room on the other side to nurse too. My milk flows WAY more strongly when they are both nursing at the same time!
My instinct is to give priority to Matthew with breastfeeding, since I know that's all he can have and he needs all that he asks for. But if Arthur has hurt himself and wants milk then I will actually take Matthew off the breast and nurse Arthur instead, if his position means I can't shuffle him to one side a bit and make room for Arthur. It is just a case of playing it by ear really, with tandem nursing.
I am loving tandem nursing on the whole and I would definitely do it again - well, I would certainly not try to avoid it if I happened to still be breastfeeding Matthew when I am expecting another baby, but I wouldn't TRY to make it happen if Matthew was actually showing signs of weaning himself. Tandem nursing is so wonderful and so precious, but I am also finding it extremely demanding. It's one of the most challenging things for me, about being a mummy to two little ones at the moment. Arthur has been going through a normal-but-tiring phase that I had read about in my tandem nursing book, where he is pretty much refusing to eat any solid foods and the result is that SOMEHOW I am almost exclusively breastfeeding a new baby and a toddler! And believe me, a toddler has a MUCH bigger appetite than a baby! Arthur asks for milk so frequently sometimes that I seem to do nothing but breastfeed one or both of them, all day long. It's SO exhausting, and draining, and I just get so thirsty and hungry all the time. Thirsty more than hungry though. I never seem to have time to get myself enough to drink so that doesn't help.
The thing is, I know it's just a phase and I don't want to push him, as it's going to pass and pushing him could backfire big time. The book says a few weeks to a couple of months of meal-refusal is common (and nothing to worry about, since my milk is very nourishing even for an exclusively breastfed toddler, though I know he is surely going to need more after a couple of months). He will still take snacks so I make sure the snacks are fruit or cheese or cereal bars. He really likes raisins and cereal bars, and I get him the toddler ones that are fortified with iron and stuff, so that is good.
We thought maybe the meal issue was to do with him having outgrown his highchair or something, at the age he is at now, so we have ditched it (with much joy - it's a pain in the arse and we'll be buying a different type of highchair for Matthew) and bought him a Handysitt booster seat so he can sit up to the table. He LOVES the booster seat and it has meant he has been a little more open to eating SOME meals, but not totally.
Okay the boys are home. Will try to type more later.
Back again - it's 8pm and the boys have both been asleep since about 7pm. Matthew is RIGHT behind me in his cot-bed (the back of my chair is 2 inches away from the cot side!) but so far he seems to be peaceful enough and doesn't seem disturbed. I'll see how much I can get typed before he gets stirry.
So the tandem nursing - hard work. Thankfully I have plenty of milk and they both get whatever they demand of me. Sometimes I feel like they EMPTIED me as I've gone down like 2 cup sizes since they started, hehe! But then Matthew will want to feed again and somehow there's still some there because he gulps and I feel the let down. So that is a wonderful thing. I honestly think they take pints and pints and pints of milk per day from me though. It feels more work for my body than ANY of Arthur's growth spurts when he was a little baby. That's another thing, I haven't actually noticed Matthew having growth spurts by his feeding. Maybe that's a feature of tandem nursing or something? There must be perlenty of milk if two of them are nursing like they are, so maybe there's no need for him to feed around the clock to work up my milk supply? It's there already, or something? I don't ever breastfeed Arthur overnight, although if he wakes and cries for me during the evening (very rare) then I'll nurse him. Matthew wakes for feeds 2 or 3 times over the 12 hour night, and not at regular, predictable times, but perhaps an example would be 1.30am, 4am and 6am. If he has only 2 wakings or if I feed him from the same side all night because I've forgotten which side I'm on, I am really engorged by the morning. I was never engorged with Arthur at any stage, so I guess I really am making enough milk for two and when only one nurses for a longer period, the milk for the other one builds up (owch!)! But then they both get a mega feed in the morning (and AFTER Arthur eats an okay breakfast too, so it's not interfering with his appetite that time).
Anyway. I hope Arthur gets more interested in food soon. We're working on getting him exposed to a bigger variety of foods, as his "acceptable" reportoire is getting smaller and smaller. Everything new I put in front of him (and eat with him - another technique we're trying), he wrinkles up his nose at, and makes a "blech!" sound in his throat! Matthew stirs.... Nope, he's okay. I'll continue!
Arthur is REALLY at the "No!" stage of toddler-hood! He says "no" ALL the time, but not just randomly like I sort of expected. If he wakes at night and doesn't see Neil there when he expected to, he'll say, "Nooo..." in this sad little voice (immediately followed by "Mama, maamaaa!") and that's usually the first sign we hear of him waking up in the evening when it happens. If he knocks down something he was building by accident, he says the same "Nooo..." in a sad voice and then gets cross and frustrated with the bricks and bashes the whole tower down angrily. If the Teletubbies is finishing (the bit where they say bye-bye), he makes such a funny exaggerated frowning expression and says, "No!" The way he says no sometimes makes it sound like the 'o' drags on and on, but like "nawwww" rather than "nooooh". Most of the time he sounds so sweet and funny when he says it that I can't help smiling! I try to hide it though. It would be most exasperating to Arthur if he saw me smiling at his frustrated outburst all the time! ;) Of course he also uses "no" for the usual stuff, in answer to most of my questions! He shakes his head instead sometimes, but he doesn't say no to EVERYTHING, only things he doesn't want. Which is a lot of things these days!
We are no longer using the "Naughty Step" method of discipline with Arthur. It didn't seem to be working and I kept on trying and trying to find a reference ANYWHERE that might tell me if he was too young for it, which was my hunch after a while, but I couldn't find anything. We stopped it anyway but his behaviour got more difficult to handle without a method of discipline (obviously!!). We really really don't want to smack (read: spank, for US readers!) our children. It's just not something I feel comfortable with, and I really don't believe it's even necessary for disciplining a child - but that is just for ME and MY children, I absolutely do not mean to judge anybody who DOES choose to discipline their children in that way. I was smacked as a child (a LOT, I was pretty naughty, hehe!) and don't particularly hold any grudges against my parents for it, but I don't feel I want to repeat it with my own children. As a child, being smacked HURT, and felt intimidating and harsh. My parents would usually combine smacking with having lost their temper with us (quite understandably, I am realising, now that I am older and wiser!), and my memory of that method of discipline was angry faces and angry eyes and intimidating grown-ups standing over me. I LOVE the Supernanny approach which teaches that you don't need to intimidate a child to discipline them, and that you should come down to their level so that you don't intimidate them, etc, and never shout or lose your temper or get angry. I can't WAIT to learn how to do that!
My mummy and I talk a lot about discipline and it's great to be the child who was disciplined by her in that way and to now be talking to her about how it was from THEIR perspective. She told me they never wanted to smack their children but they just felt driven to it and didn't know how else to gain control over our behaviour sometimes. She said they would go through times when they would smack us and then have long talks and decide it wasn't right or that it wasn't working (as it didn't seem to be taking effect sometimes), so then they'd try to stop and end up "driven to it" again. My poor parents! I appreciate soooooo much more what they went through now that I am a parent myself, and I haven't even got to the stage where my kids are old enough to REALLY play up yet! I am so glad I am really close with my parents and can talk to them in such detail about these things. It really helps to figure things out.
Anyway, what eventually happened is that Neil and I felt more and more out of control over some of Arthur's behaviour (especially hurting us on purpose), and loss of control plus loss of temper = lashing out angrily to try and "fix" it, and the result of that has been that Arthur has been smacked a few times. The first time I smacked him, he was kicking and scratching at me (and laughing), and I warned him that if he did it again I would smack him. I did not get wound up, I just calmly warned him. He did it again immediately so I smacked him on the leg. He laughed, which I totally did not expect! I felt BAD for smacking him but this HUGE sense of relief at somehow having grabbed some control of the situation, though it didn't seem to affect him then and there. He was still behaving like that later that day and he hurt Neil the same way, and when Neil warned him and then smacked him, he cried. Then we both felt way too bad about it and said to each other that we were never doing that again. We spent time with Arthur hugging him and telling him we loved him and that it was wrong of Mummy and Daddy to hurt him back for something. Urgh. And then about a week later the same thing happened and he got smacked again :( We just felt absolutely OUT of any other options, and didn't know what else to do. We can't just let him hurt us like that. But it definitely doesn't feel like a good thing to hurt him back - what does that teach him?!
I finally bought two Supernanny books so that I could have an easy reference to some of her ideas that I definitely want to use, and I was hoping the books would tell me about the right age for using the techniques. Sure enough, he is too young for the Naughty Step technique. She recommends starting that at age two, which we will most definitely do. I love that method. It WORKS, and it's gentle and simple and doesn't intimidate the little one, or raise a parent's temper. She said that before age two, children are not able to understand the process that goes with the Naughty Step technique, and she suggested that you remove your child from the situation they are in if they misbehave. So if they hurt another child while they're doing some fun activity together, they get taken away from the fun activity and thus the message gets across much more simply for them.
So we've been using a similar approach since I read that. Arthur is quite predictable at really playing up during nappy changes, especially pooey ones. He kicks and squirms and does his best to sabotage our efforts to change him hygenically! If we ask him to stop, he laughs and does it more. If we tell him that hurts Mummy and he mustn't do it, he hurts me harder. So we now set it up to our advantage. We give him a toy or object that he loves playing with, or put something on the telly that he loves, just for the nappy-change. The moment he starts acting up, we tell him he must not do that and explain why, and then tell him that if he does it again we will take the toy away from him, or switch off the Teletubbies, etc. You can see him stopping to think about that, something he didn't seem to do much with the other methods we tried, and then if he REALLY doesn't want the Teletubbies to get switched off, say, he will usually frown at me and say, "Nooo!" So I tell him he must be a good boy and lie still for Mummy, or not kick Mummy, or whatever. This is often all I have to do, but if he does kick me again then I have the wonderful luxury of NOT getting worked up in the least, and simply telling him he does not get to watch any more Teletubbies because he kicked Mummy, and leaning over and switching it off, and there we have it! Discipline achieved!!! :) It's so simple and SUCH a relief when it happens. I feel completely in control where I NEED to be in control, and yet I don't get angry or stressed, and I don't have to hurt Arthur, and he doesn't get intimidated by me. Soooo simple! :) He cries a lot when I switch it off or take away the toy he is playing with, but I just explain again why I did it, and he has to lump it. He doesn't play up again after that, during that nappy-change. I think if he DID, I might be stuck, since I would have used my "bargaining tool" (as Neil and I call it, hehe - "I'm just going to change Arthur"..."Okay - wait, have you got a bargaining tool?" hehehe!) and then I'm not sure what else I'd use to get my point across.
Anyway that is working MUCH better for us, but there are still windows where he does something we HAVE to take a stand against and it happens to be in a situation where he doesn't care one bit about any object or entertainment around him, and thus we have nothing to implement that kind of discipline with! Sometimes in those situations we might remind him of something that's coming up later that he enjoys, like he likes playing "tents" with Daddy under the duvet cover before he goes to sleep at bedtime. Neil sometimes tells him if he doesn't stop X, Y or Z right now, he will not get to play tents at bedtime. And we have to follow through on whatever we say, which is sometimes so sad. I hate having to take things away from Arthur that he loves, but I love him enough to discipline him when he misbehaves, and it's important that I am consistent with whatever method we choose to use. I hate it MUCH less than using my hand to strike him though. Much less. So we'll continue like this until he's two and then reassess, and maybe start the Naughty Step technique then, or maybe wait a while longer. Supernanny said some children aren't ready for that till they are 2 and a half.
Anyway, what a LONG waffle about discipline! I think I'll post some more photos and change the subject!
Bedtimes are going better and better. Matthew seems very strong, physically, and his head control is really good. We decided he is ready to join Arthur and Daddy for "big boy bathtime" in the evenings!! This has been something Neil and Arthur have done since he was just a few months old. I don't think we really intended it to be a permanent thing, but it's just how it panned out. I have never bathed with Arthur since, and Arthur has only ever bathed with Daddy since then! I bathed him once a couple of weeks ago because he pooed EVERYWHERE (teething poo) and had a horrible painful rash on his poor bummy that made him cry and shake just by walking :( It got that bad out of NOWHERE, in just a couple of hours, and then we noticed the tooth. Pesky teething! Anyway so I bathed him before Neil was home from work that time, but other than that he has had every single bath with Neil since he was a little baby. So it's quite a big thing for Matthew to join in! Here is Matthew's very first "big boy" bath, with Arthur and Neil (no bubbles on that occasion due to over-paranoia about Matthew's new delicate skin!):
He did really well! I thought he'd cry but he didn't, he just seemed calm and happy to be there. He only freaked out a tiny bit when Arthur tried to wash his hair (which you can see in the photo!), but he was happy as anything otherwise! He has had quite a few baths with Arthur and Daddy since then and he seems to love them! While they are bathing, I sit by the bath and wash Matthew's hair so that Neil has hands free to hold Matthew and play with Arthur, and then I take Matthew and dress him for bed while Neil gets Arthur ready for bed. I lay down in bed with Matthew (in the spare room) and breastfeed him - the only time I ever breastfeed him BEFORE sleep. We are still following the E.A.S.Y. routine with Matthew so he gets fed when he wakes up, and it's going well. So I nurse him before bed, and if Neil has finished getting Arthur ready for bed before I'm finished with Matthew, he and Arthur play tents and read the Toddler's Bible and stuff, till I hand Matthew to him for burping and rocking. Then Neil puts Matthew to bed once he's all sleepy (he goes right to sleep, but it can take a while to get him sleepy enough), while I breastfeed Arthur in his bed. Arthur goes to sleep well, usually. Sometimes I get sore and have to stop breastfeeding him if it's just going on for EVER, and then Neil comes in and lies with him till he's asleep while I tidy the toys away downstairs. It sounds complicated but it's not, it feels easy and it really works for us. Both the boys are usually asleep for the night by 7.30pm, and they both sleep through the evening till at least our bedtime. Matthew will go till 1.30am or sometimes a bit later if nothing disturbs him before then, and Arthur usually sleeps through the night. Sometimes he wakes or stirs a lot and Neil resettles him pretty quickly.
Anyway so it's GREAT to have our evenings to ourselves! We have the air-conditioning roaring away upstairs all the time, despite the weather being a lot cooler. The house still seems too warm (21 degrees or warmer without the A/C in the bedrooms) so we keep it on. I am slightly nervous about when it's too cold to use it anymore, because the sound it makes is REALLY useful in helping the boys not be disturbed by random sounds, or by each other when they wake in the night. We watch the TV in the evenings without headphones, which is something we haven't done since Arthur was a newborn!!! He was just soooo difficult with sleep and woke at the tiniest sound, so we ended up wearing headphones in the evenings to watch TV and creeping around like mice! I'm so glad that's over with! We'll have to try and continue with normal household sounds for Matthew. I'm sure he'll be fine with it, if he's used to it. I expect they might wake a little more at first once the A/C is off, but hopefully they'll adjust quickly.
Time for more photos I think! Matthew doesn't seem bothered by my typing but I want to hurry and finish, as this entry is getting long and it's getting late too. My dinner is almost ready so I need to hurry up.
We got a WONDERFUL package from my lovely friend Lisa a few weeks ago! Lisa found me through my pregnancy diary when she was pregnant with her sweet little girl, Aeres, who is the same age as Arthur. It was SO exciting to receive a package from the States with SUCH beautiful gifts inside, some for Arthur, some for Matthew (the CUTEST outfits!) and a special one for Neil and I - a beautifully framed photo of Matthew and Arthur when Matthew was 10 days old!!! It's my very favourite photo and I had longed to get it printed and framed (which Lisa didn't know!) so it was really touching to receive such a special gift. Anyway, here are a couple of photos of Arthur while he was opening Lisa's package - he was so pleased to see the framed photo! He said (with huge pride!) "Aaah-yah!" (Arthur) when he saw himself in the picture, and gazed for ages before he said "Ma-Ma" as well :) He also insisted on trying to put the new teeny tiny shoes for Matthew on his own feet!
And here are a couple of photos of Matthew (at 7 weeks old) in one of the super cute outfits that Lisa sent:
See my sweet smiley boy?! I love that baby boy SOOOOOOOO much, I just can't tell you. He's the sweetest thing! He is starting to fill out a little more this week, and today we noticed the beginnings of little rolls at the top of his legs and arms :) I wonder if he'll be a chunky chubby boy like Arthur was? They are VERY different shapes though. The health visitor weighed Matthew a week ago and he was 11lbs 4oz - only a 5oz gain (just under) since almost 2 weeks before. It dropped him to the 25th percentile (from the 50th), and although the health visitor said it was fine, it still felt kind of strange to me because of how Arthur did the absolute opposite at the same age - jumping from the 50th to the 80th percentile and staying there for many months!
She said that it was obvious that Matthew was a very different shape to Arthur, longer and leaner, like Neil. She also reminded me that it's normal for breastfed babies to gain more slowly at first than formula fed babies, and thus it looks like they have dropped their percentile on the charts, as the charts are based on formula fed babies (how stupid?!). She said Arthur was not the "norm" for weight gain in breastfed babies! So I shouldn't worry about Matthew's weight. He is content and doesn't seem hungry in between feeds. He doesn't feed overly frequently, and he gets full enough to refuse and bring up a TON of milk at the end of each feed, so I'm sure he must be getting enough, BUT his feeds are crazy short. He finishes all he wants in 4 or 5 minutes. The health visitor thinks because of my strong let-down reflex, that he really is getting all that milk in such a short space of time, and he doesn't need to nurse for longer. But she said I should always offer him the second breast anyway, even if he refuses. I realised that I had stopped offering the second side because I guess I was pre-empting his refusal. I am happy to relax about his weight once I have tried offering him the other side for a while and his percentile stays the same. I've been doing it more since she weighed him and he mostly DOES take a little from the other side. Not much though - he seems pretty full.
Also he was weighed four hours after he was last fed, as he had just woken up from a 3-hour nap and she weighed him first and then I fed him, so that will have affected his weight a bit, she said. And he was weighed on a day where I had been unwell for 3 days (I was better by the next day though) with some weird sinusy dizzy thing that I couldn't figure out for ANYTHING, but which oddly seemed to noticably affect my milk supply. It bounced back up after I felt better though, but anyway she said that could have affected it too. She is going to weigh him on Wednesday just to see how he's doing, but she is happy with him as he is.
Wednesday is a big day for the boys. We are going to the clinic to have vaccinations done :( Matthew is having his first round of the 6-in-1 Hibb booster, and I've made a double appointment because Arthur is going to have his MMR. I am horribly nervous about it. But it just needs DOING, and then it's done. We'll be doing the playgroup scene like crazy (I expect) from September and measles is at its highest rate in 20 years in this country. I delayed the MMR for a while but always intended him to have it, so I guess it's time. I hope hope hope it's all going to be okay though. I'm sure it WILL be, but it's easy to get nervous with all the hype, you know? Anyway, fun fun Wednesday, Calpol at the ready, etc! I will be glad when it's over and done with, and I just hope they don't suffer too much with side effects.
Oh, I know what else I meant to catch up on! We have had two visits with Neil's sister and her baby girl, Ella, since Matthew was born! The first one was when Matthew was a couple of weeks old and they came to visit us. I found a few photos on my camera of Arthur entertaining Ella with a muslin cloth on the sofa (!!):
Funny boy! I love how Ella was clapping him in that last one, hehe! Anyway then we drove to see them (an hour away) a few weekends ago because Neil's mum and youngest sister were staying with them and they still hadn't met Matthew yet. It was a lovely afternoon but SUCH a total nightmare getting there and back, to the point where we had to decide not to do that kind of drive again. We have put a limit on car journeys now, based on what the boys can tolerate, which is pretty short at the moment - only 30 minutes. Any longer than that and the journey is a totally stressed out nightmare for everyone, and we end up having to stop at least twice to calm Matthew down or something, and we end up frazzled and late for the thing we were driving to, and Matthew is just exhausted and sobbing and overheated and Arthur is getting fed up too. It's just not worth it. People will have to come to us for a while. But it was nice to see everyone while we were there, and they made us a lovely lunch (which they had to keep warm in the oven for a while!) and it was great to see Ella, and to watch Neil's mum proudly holding another new grandchild.
Ella had a push-along car thingy that converted so you could ride it, and Arthur LOVED that! He rode it a lot in their garden:
Even better, they had a black rabbit called Harry, and Arthur could not get enough of trying to see Harry at ALL times, while Harry tried desperately to escape and hide all over the garden! Arthur isn't (yet) the kind of toddler who bears down on small creatures and birds aggressively at high speed, thank goodness! He just wants to see them, and stands back a bit, but if they go out of sight then he wants to find them so he can see them again. Here he is watching Harry, who is frantically disappearing at a run out of the shot, hehehe!
I love this photo of Arthur and Ella with their lovely attentive daddies! It was just a random shot of various happenings around the garden while we were all out there, but I love it because it captures how lovely Neil is at playing with Arthur and how careful and attentive Leigh is with Ella. He is such a nice guy, and such a lovely father. Ella is walking now, and she kept trying to keep up with Arthur, but he just RUNS all the time and poor Ella just kept getting left to watch him! She'll be keeping up with him in no time though, I'm sure. Anyway, the photo!
I keep forgetting that Matthew and Ella share the same birthday! How amazing that is! She's such a sweet little girl, and she smiles prettily and waves and is just generally completely adorable! It was so nice to see them.
Urgh this entry is soooooo long and it's getting so late. I need to go to bed! But I have SO much more to say and soooo many photos to post yet!
Here are a couple of photos that I love (taken when Matthew was about 4 weeks old, and not quite at the peak of his hatred of car journeys!) - Neil took the boys out for a short drive to the park to give me a break to rest one Saturday, and they both fell asleep in the car (very unusual for either of them actually!). When he got home they still hadn't woken, so he came inside and fetched me to see them, and I took a couple of photos. That's when we really realised we suddenly had a car full of boys! I mean, only TWO boys, and tiny ones at that, but the car was full! You can't fit another car seat between theirs, even in our big car. It was just full of sleeping boys :)
Okay that is all for now. I think I'll just have to save the rest for another entry, which I'll TRY to get done soon. Matthew seems to have slept fine with me typing away and hasn't stirred any more than usual, so maybe it'll be okay to try to go online more often? I still feel funny about it though. It's like I'm invading his sleeping space and it just doesn't feel right somehow. Anyway I will try to get updated and all the photos posted soon, and then hopefully not leave it so long before catching up again! Back soon I hope!
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