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2006-03-26 - 11.10pm previous entry next entry
Lonnnnnng update and photos!
Ohhh my gosh, TWO WEEKS since my last entry! This will never do! I seem to have no time to update, or when I do, I am too tired. But now I just have waaay too much to write about in one go! Neil and Arthur are taking a walk in the park, but not for much longer, so I have a little window of time to start a diary entry.
Let's see. I will have to try and summarise briefly or something, and then get on with photos and more detailed stuff! I have toooo many photos to post this entry, seriously. Maybe I'll have to split it into two entries? We'll see.
Okay so what has happened in the past two weeks?
Arthur and I went to Playgroup, not last Wednesday but the one before, as he had just got over the cold he caught from the time we went before. He had a nice time, but got cranky during song time, which seems to be an increasingly common thing for Arthur. He just LOVES the toys and running around so much that he hates the bit where you have to sit still, even for singing (which he actually loves)! Arthur runs EVERYWHERE now. He has totally got the hang of it. It's still a cute stumpy little toddler's run, but not so stumbly anymore - he doesn't look like he's about to fall down at any second like he used to! He loves to run and does it complete with exaggerated fast breathing too :) He gets so excited about the speed he's going at or something, bless him!
Anyway, Playgroup was good. I got brave and took the camera, and ignored the attention I created every time the flash went off! I just want photos of my lil man doing stuff that I know I'll be wistfully remembering in NO time at all! So here he is during drink-and-biscuit time. He is sat right at the back on the far right, contemplating his biscuit and the kids in front of him! He never looks for me. He didn't even notice I had slipped off to take his photo, or that I had come back again! This was about half the children on this particular day. There isn't enough room for them all to have their drinks and biscuits at once:
As soon as he'd finished his biscuit, he climbed out of his chair (he doesn't like to hang around!) and rushed off to the big hall to play. It was nice and empty with most of the little ones having their snacks. Arthur did his usual thing, walked around looking at all the toys until he settled on one or two that he chose to play with, and never looked for me once! Here he is pushing a wooden trolley thingy, and playing with a toy hoover. After that he ran out of the hall and I followed, and that was the end of my photo-taking opportunities! But it was fun :)
Except that by the weekend Arthur had ANOTHER cold, ugh! This brings his total since the beginning of January to 4 colds and a viral cough! Before that he had like ONE cold in his whole life! Or was it two? Anyway, it's a completely different picture this year. He is averaging a cold every other week! It's not nice for him and it makes life more difficult for Neil and I, but I'm not too unhappy about it. It's great practise for his immune system (which he really needs) and I just thank God that it hasn't been vomity bugs all this time. Colds I can handle! The only other thing that makes me curious is that the first week of January is the exact same week that my breastmilk dried up. He hasn't had any since, although he has continued nursing. That totally coincides with the start of all these colds (to the week!). I think my milk must have been playing a much bigger part than I thought in protecting him against colds and stuff. I read that it's true, but I didn't really believe it somehow! Also I know lots of people who breastfeed and their babies still have a ton of colds and bugs. But I guess in our case it really HAS been true that my milk has made a big difference, immune-wise for Arthur. He has had a little more exposure to other children in the same time-frame though, so it's probably partly that. And the time of year, etc. In the last week or so, I have started producing colostrum ready for the new baby, and I can't even DESCRIBE how excited I am about it!! Arthur is getting some goodness from me again, and I'm thrilled! He nurses as much as always, and showed absolutely no signs of registering the arrival of colostrum! He is just like that with breastfeeding. I am so excited to be able to officially call it "breastfeeding" again too! :) I felt funny about calling it that when I had zero milk, but now he's getting something, I am "feeding" him again :)
Anyway. So he has had a cold. Neil and I both caught it this time and felt crappy for a few days, but we seem to have thrown it off pretty quickly. Arthur is almost better. Still a bit snotty but it's a week since it started so he's well out of the woods now :) I am taking him to the doctor tomorrow though, because he keeps having miserable moments that aren't like him at all, and we wonder if he's hurting somewhere, so we give him Calpol and he's right as rain within 30 minutes. I wonder if he might have an ear infection or something? He has no temperature and is eating and otherwise fine, but it's best to get these things checked out, so I'll take him. He is a PERMANENT teether though, so it could always be teeth.
Oh this was meant to be a summary! Whoops! What else has happened lately?
Oh my parents came to visit!!!!! Yay! It was soooo nice to see them! Arthur doesn't get to see them often, but he seemed to actually remember them (I wasn't sure that was even possible at his age, since he last saw them at 13 months old - surely before he can do that kind of long-term memory?) and loved every second of their company! I did too :) Mummy spent a whole day with us on the Monday, and then she and Daddy visited us together for a couple of hours the next day. Here is a photo of Arthur and my Daddy, just before Arthur went upstairs for his nap and Mummy and Daddy left:
Arthur just seems so relaxed with my parents, which I'm so glad about as I thought it might be the other way around since he rarely sees them. He is a particular fan of Grandy (my daddy) and posed for the above photo without any arranging from us! I just grabbed the camera :) Their visit was over far too quickly, but they are coming back in a week or two for a couple of days :) They came because Granny had a hip replacement and they wanted to help out and visit her in hospital and stuff, and they're coming back to do similar stuff again. Her op went really well and she is at home and doing great, so I'm really happy and relieved about that. Arthur and I are going to visit on Tuesday :) Arthur drew a picture with his crayons and I made it into a card for Granny. She loved it! I love that Arthur is really getting into drawing more, though he presses sooooooo lightly with pens/pencils/crayons that you can hardly see anything on the page! He is getting the hang of dotting (well, banging!) the crayon onto the paper and making dots and lines that way, which are much more bold and he likes to see what he has drawn. He likes to use ALL the colours on one drawing, not just one or two! I'm relieved that he has finally stopped trying to eat the crayons! He is more interested in sorting them than drawing still. He sorts EVERYTHING. It's his passion ;)
He had his wooden bricks out a week or so ago and was playing with them for ages really quietly. When I stopped to see what he was doing, I found he was sorting them into shapes and had already built two long lines of different types of shapes along the carpet! I took a photo, and he didn't even bat an eyelid, he was that engrossed! He usually stops whatever he's doing to get hold of the camera, but lately he has started to find things too absorbing to bother with the camera. Here he is with his sorted bricks (thick rectangles and thin rectangles), and you can see he is busy working on sorting the arch-shaped bricks and putting them in a line too :)
Last week, Arthur and I went shopping in town as he desperately needed new shoes again. He is now in a Clarks size 4.5G, but a 4G in Startrite. I am picky and those the only two brands I will consider for him. Good shoes with the right fit are soooo important for little ones. They have to be good quality for their growing feet, and to support all the new things they are learning to do properly. In Arthur's case, he especially needs good shoes with a perfect fit because of his previous troubles with his feet. The physio had told me I should buy him new unused shoes, not ones that someone had previously worn, because his feet are a different shape to most, and he needs a brand new shoe to mould to his own foot shape. Urgh. She's absolutely right, of course, but we can't afford it!! We have just NO money at the moment, and good quality baby shoes are so expensive, and he outgrows them every other month at the moment. But we decided it's a priority. I keep my eyes peeled at eBay constantly, because occasionally someone sells a brand new, unused pair of Clarks or Startrite shoes in his size. But I could barely squeeze his previous shoes on his feet last week, so we had to go shopping.
After MUCH deliberation, I bought him a pair of leather Startrite shoes that should hopefully fit him for another six weeks. They were �31!!! But fantastic quality and well worth the money. And they fit him wonderfully :) He had a few days of tripping over the toes every few steps but he's used to them now. Oddly enough, some of the Clarks and Startrite shoes that he tried on in the shops didn't fit his foot shape well at all. I had presumed if one design in that brand fit him, they all would, but the sales lady said that all the designs are shaped a little differently, even for the same brand. Who knew! There is so much detail about children's shoes, and it's harder than I thought to get the fit just perfect for the individual little one. It's also good to know because now I need to be careful I don't bid on a new pair of shoes on eBay that is in a design I haven't had him tried in, as it might not fit him well after all.
Hmmm, where are those boys? It's past Arthur's tea time.... I should think they walked further than they expected and will probably be home any minute. It's raining so maybe they are drying off or something?! Arthur doesn't seem to mind walking in the rain, and we have a sweet little red raincoat for him so he keeps nice and dry :) When they get home I'll have to stop this and finish it later if I have the energy. Evenings are just pfthth at the moment.
Oh but when we were in town, I decided to splash out (!) and buy Arthur some Stickle Bricks! They're not enormously expensive and I have wanted some for him for months, but lately I can see that he would REALLY get so much out of playing with them - they are just the perfect kind of toy for him right now, with how much he loves building and sorting things. They are different from any of the building stuff he has played with so far. I really wanted some for him. My mum wanted to buy some for him when she was here, but she couldn't find any in the shops, so we went hunting for some last week! I finally found some in The Entertainer :) When we got home from town, we were running late for Arthur's lunch. He usually does NOT tolerate this well!! He likes his lunch on time! I went straight to the kitchen to prepare his lunch, but Arthur was clutching and fussing around the new box of Stickle Bricks, which he had pulled out of the shopping bag. In the end I took the packaging off it for him, helped him take the lid off the box, and left him to explore it while I made lunch.
I called him from the kitchen when it was ready - usually if he isn't already in there clamouring for his food while I'm making it, he comes running when I call him for lunch! But he didn't come! So I went to see what was keeping him. He was absolutely engrossed in playing with his new Stickle Bricks! I told him it was time for lunch and he didn't even look up! I honestly never saw him so enthralled with a new toy before, even his iron, which is saying something! Although his iron was slightly different - he was just plain THRILLED and excited about it! With the Stickle Bricks, he was instantly absorbed and nothing could tempt him away! He had already started sorting and pressing together the various shapes and colours. I sat with him for 5 minutes and took some pictures. Here they are :) He had already sorted the blue squares into one sticky bundle, and the long red rectangles. And the little bundle of circles in front of him, with all different colours. He was working on the green rectangles when I was sitting with him, and he was soooo pleased with himself when he finished sticking them all together!...
Hehe! After that he stuck the long thin orange ones together and then worked on a few more circles:
He loves those Stickle Bricks soooo much! I am so glad I got them for him, and that I was right about them being a great buy for him right now. He has played with them such a lot already! I wish I had bought them for him around his first birthday when I initially wanted him to have some, but we chose set things to spend the money on and planned to get him some later. Oh well. Better now than not at all! :) They keep him happy in the car if we are sitting in traffic or going on a longer journey than usual, he just loves them! I love to watch him play with them. He has such cute expressions of extreme concentration! I love to watch him concentrate on stuff.
Okay I hear the car pulling up, so I will finish this later and get my lil man some tea! :)
Back, and Arthur is asleep for the night. The clocks went forward last night but he is so far following all the normal times even with the change, which is good (so far!). It's 8pm now and he's been asleep for 10 minutes or so, which is even a little on the early side for Arthur! He woke up at his normal 6.30am today but our clocks said that was 7.30am. I hope he doesn't get wise and adjust!
We are in the process of making some big changes to our two bedrooms in preparation for becoming a family of four! We plan to all sleep in our bedroom (the bigger one), as that's what we do now, and I don't want to be separated from my little ones at night anyway. Well, that's awfully hypocritical of me, considering that I have been sleeping in the other bedroom (on my own!) for most of my pregnancy!!! But Arthur and Neil sleep in the big family bed. I sometimes sleep there with them, but mostly I have soooo needed extra sleep since getting pregnant that I have had to sleep in the other bedroom. My sleep gets so much worse when I'm pregnant, and I have always found it hard to sleep with Neil when I'm having a run of bad sleep! He's so noisy - not snoring, but grinding and chomping (!!) and snuffling and doing these ENORMOUS deep breaths that sound like all the air being let out of a balloon. Loudly! It drives me crazy. He tosses and turns a lot too, but remains dead to the world throughout, somehow! I, on the other hand, get disturbed a lot by his fidgettiness. Add to that a toddler who still likes to wake and be resettled by Mummy between 1 and 4 times per night, and I just end up with no choice but to sleep away from them while I'm pregnant so that the little sleep I DO get is at least decent quality! But I miss being all close and snuggly with them. I am just not a good sleeper.
I don't think Arthur is disturbed by Neil's fidgetting though. Sometimes I hear Neil from across the hall (!) and Arthur always sleeps soundly through it. He tends to wake at vaguely predictable times, like he is just in the habit of waking around those times, and even me not nursing him has not managed to break that habit. I don't know what else to do really. We are more sure than we have ever been that we will not CIO. He does roll all OVER the bed though, and sometimes that's why he wakes. He ends up in the corner or out of the covers along the pillows! I think we really need to get going with our plan to transition him to the single mattress part of the family floor bed, as that will restrict his space and hopefully lead to less rolling around and getting stuck or uncovered.
Anyway. We aren't sure about co-sleeping with Matthew, because it has just been SO hard with Arthur. I desperately want to co-sleep, as nothing else feels natural to me. But with Arthur still so newbornish in his night-waking patterns, and the worry about Matthew doing the same thing, we are just simply nervous about how we'd manage. So far we are thinking to have Matthew sleep in the moses basket at the foot of our part of the bed. That way Arthur wouldn't have any access to him in the night, or at least none that wouldn't wake us up as he clambered over us! Realistically, I think I will end up with Matthew in the bed with us plenty anyway, because it's infinitely easier to breastfeed at night that way! So we'll see how that pans out. By the time he outgrows the moses basket, we'll know whether to move him to the bassinet part of the travel cot and maybe the cotbed after that, or co-sleep with both our boys :)
The only thing I was anxious about was if it was a total disaster for all of us to be in the same room. Like if Matthew was colicky or hard to settle at night, and woke Arthur a lot in the same room. I'm not trying to be pessimistic about things, but we have had such a difficult time with Arthur's sleep from the start, that I think it's the most self-preserving way to think! If I think we might have the same troubles, or worse, then I'll be prepared if that happens. If they don't happen then it's a WONDERFUL bonus! My mum has always said that it's a blessing to have your first child be a difficult sleeper. That way you're "toughened" to it (!!) and when you then have a child who sleeps well it is just bliss! She had so many friends who had it the other way round when my brother and I were little - their first babies were little angels with sleep and stuff, and then it was like they were hit by a mack truck when they went on to have a child/children who were difficult to manage with sleep. They all agreed that it would have been easier to deal with on the first child, so she keeps reminding me of that! Obviously I was the difficult sleeper in my family, and the firstborn! My brother started sleeping through the night at 10 weeks old!!!!!!!! My mum didn't know what to do with herself, hehe! I HOPE it's that way for us, but I feel slightly depressingly like we won't be that lucky.
Anyway so I was starting to get anxious about having a "Plan B" in case it all went horribly wrong! We decided that Plan B should involve me and Matthew sleeping in one bedroom, and Neil and Arthur in the other. Neither of us want to put Arthur or Matthew in their own room yet. They will still be soooo little, and Arthur seems to benefit enormously from all this constant proximity to us. I feel so proud that he's 16 and a half months old and has never been separated from us (well, me, but Neil too with the exception of work hours and one or two nights) for more than.... I can't even think. An hour? Maybe not even that! If he's on his own in a room for longer, it's because he's sleeping in our bed during the evening while we are downstairs. But that is the extent of his separation from us so far. It means we don't go out, don't get babysitters in... I can't even think what else we don't get to do, because to be honest we never really do that stuff anyway, even before Arthur came along. We're not big go-er outers. The only thing we used to do that we can't do anymore while we go with our guts to stay close to our little ones, is evening housegroup at church. We were a bit crappy at attending it anyway, though I do miss it sometimes. I go to the fellowship group during the day with Arthur though.
LOTS of people are starting to think (now that Arthur is getting older) that we are doing him harm by sticking so close to him, and by the fact that he has never even had a grandparent take him out for an hour or two without us. Arthur doesn't have grandparents who live locally, in fact you can count on your fingers the number of times he's seen them in his life. We haven't been blessed to have close friends and family around locally to support us, which has made it a much harder job for us than many. But it's okay. We already knew we did not plan to leave Arthur during his first year at least, as in to go out for the evening and get a babysitter in, or to leave him in creche or something for a couple of hours. It just didn't feel right to us, for the way we wanted to do things with Arthur, so that's why we chose it. People are always saying we ought to just do it, that we "deserve" time out, and that Arthur will probably be fine with it. But they don't get it at all, because none of that is the point. I am not sure when we WILL leave him for the first time, but I can't imagine doing it any time soon, especially with Matthew on the way. Delightfully, Arthur has proven the Attachment Parenting theories right in his case, being a completely secure, happy and independent little boy from very early on. He has never had to wonder where his Mummy is or become anxious about anything without me there. He doesn't even consider keeping an eye out to make sure I'm still there when we're at Playgroup or places full of people. He is just 100% sure that I will be, and I always am. He is already taking steps of confident independence away from me that *I* don't feel ready for, hehe! We'll do the same thing with Matthew and any other children we have, for sure, even if that means we don't get time out much for many years. We're lucky that we're the kind of couple who don't actually LIKE going out! ;) I hate pubs and drinking. We aren't crazy about parties. We have never been social climbers as a couple really. We like movies on our own TV and pizza for a special evening together, or a nice meal in our own home. I don't like eating out anyway. I DO sometimes think it would be nice to go to the cinema together if there's EVER a good movie out (rare, it seems!), but oh well. It doesn't matter, we just rent it when it's out and enjoy it just as much :) Also we can't afford to go out in any case, so we're saving money, hehe! ;)
Wow, that was a big random waffle! I can't even remember what my point was when I started that! Ohhh yes, sleep and separating from our little ones! So, to summarise, we don't want to do that! We're happy with the back-up of temporarily having me and Matthew in the smaller bedroom, and Neil and Arthur in our room where they have always been. BUT, the small bedroom is a big dumping ground for furniture, and the room where everything gets done that can't be done anywhere else in the house (if that makes sense!). So it's CRAMMED with furniture, so that there's hardly any room to actually move about. And the computer is in there, where I'm sat now :) And my sewing stuff (masses of it), and all our books. And clothes storage for Arthur and Neil. We needed to clear some furniture out of our bedroom when we made a big family floor-bed, so this is where it ended up. But I couldn't possibly be in here with Matthew the way it is. We talked for ages and made a plan!
I decided we needed to put up more shelving on the walls for books and fabric, and get rid of the enormous free-standing bookshelf that took up so much floor space and room. Then dismantle the wardrobe that is used for storing all of Arthur's clothes. And acquire a double chest of drawers or something similar, because something like that will be the entire clothes storage for both our boys, and they'll probably share a room when they're older too, so it will still be in action for them for YEARS to come! We also needed to put the bedside tables and a blanket box in the loft, because they were taking up room without much useful storage space. And in the end I want to dismantle and store both of our normal sized chest of drawers, and replace them with one single "slim Jim" thingy, you know, the tall narrow chest of drawers that are like a reeeally tall bedside table full of drawers. I reckon if we make better use of the storage space in our big wardrobe (in our bedroom) and get ruthless on which clothes we keep and which we give to charity, we should be able to cope with just the tall drawer thingy instead of two chests of drawers! That will take up WAY less space. And finally, store away the current computer desk (it's enormous) and acquire an old fashioned dressing table - the type without much depth to the surface so it doesn't stick out from the wall very far, but which also has two sets of drawers either side of a space to sit at. That way we'd have more drawers to store things in, and still have a computer desk, but one which didn't stick out so much and take up so much space in a small room. Phew!
Obviously we can't afford new furniture, but we started looking on eBay right away, and I found a FANTASTIC double chest of drawers with children's animal handles! It's beautiful and in wonderful condition, and enormously spacious. We bid and won for �50!!! I had just made �54 selling a few maternity clothes and bras on eBay a few weeks ago, so we felt GREAT about that! Neil had to hire a van to pick it up though, so that was extra cost. He got it yesterday from North London, and somehow we got it upstairs. Neil took the wardrobe apart and stored it, and the blanket box and bedside table, in the loft. So now the small bedroom already has SO much more space in it, and a huge and beautiful piece of furniture full of both our little boys' clothing! It is so lovely to open drawers and see clothes for Arthur and teeny tiny clothes for Matthew! More and more, we are feeling like we really do have TWO boys, even though one is not quite here yet!! It's lovely :)
Now we are looking out for a cheap dressing table. And I have moved my fabrics. After all that, we have to look out for a tall drawer thingy and store our chests of drawers, and then there will be lots of space for the travel cot or moses basket to go right up against the single bed in the small bedroom, for me and Matthew :) I'm so pleased we worked it out, because I was getting antsy about it before, and also it has filled my yearning for some nesting and decluttering, which I haven't been able to tend to for a while lately!
Wow, that was long and drawn-out! Sorry! But that and the cold have been the reasons I haven't had time or energy to write for a while. I hope things will settle down soon!
What else can I say about Arthur? I need to get his hair cut again! Already! I keep putting it off, but it is getting longer and it gets in a terrible tangle at the back after he naps now! He has permanent fluffy-head at the back, hehe! It's so sweet :) But I can't seem to comb it out so I think I ought to get his hair cut so that it's easier to deal with or something!
Ahhh, he's so cute :) I love him so much!
He continues to be a little monkey, testing me all over the place! He climbs everywhere now, and puts toys at the foot of pieces of furniture specifically so that he can use them as a step-stool and reach whatever is on the surface! Just this morning he set the tumble dryer off, put a clean wash load on a spin cycle (when it didn't need it!) and switched the dishwasher off mid-cycle! He was getting into the freezer SO many times per day that in the end I went out and bought our very first real baby-proofing device (other than the stair gate of course!). It's a freezer lock and I LOVE it!! It didn't need tools or fittings to fix on, it took seconds to apply, and now Arthur can't get in that freezer no matter how hard he tries! He was a little frustrated at first, but now he has started concentrating quietly when he fiddles with it! We are kind of nervous that he'll figure it out! He already somehow knows to push the button that releases it (he has never seen us open it!) but so far hasn't figured out that he needs to slide it across once the button is pushed in. Hmmm. I hope he won't figure it out, as I was planning to get another one for the cleaning cupboard under the sink, which is currently tied closed (even from Mummy and Daddy!) with tight rubber bands!
Arthur particularly likes to climb on things that he KNOWS he isn't allowed to climb on, of course! He likes to be found by me, doing it. Or to be daring enough to try it in front of me and watch my reaction! Monkey boy! Here he is on my return from emptying the poo from his nappy down the loo the other day during a nappy change (please excuse the Teletubbies - I hate them SO, but they are a wonderful distraction for Arthur at wriggly pooey nappy changes, I have discovered!):
See his fluffle-hair that I was talking about?! Poor Boo! But *I* find it cute, anyway :)
Arthur has discovered the joys of actually riding his sit-on car now! He used to just push it about, walking behind it, with a huge smile on his face. Now he likes to climb on it and sit, saying, "Brum! Brum!" He does push himself around on it with his feet, but not very fast yet. He also likes to climb onto it and stand on the seat, and try to jump up and down. Urgh. He suddenly took to it when the Grand Prix was on a couple of weeks ago! He wanted to watch it with his daddy, but sitting ON his own car :) Here he is doing that:
Matthew has hiccups :)
Arthur is getting so good at sorting the laundry with me! It's something he really loves to do. I dump everything into the basket from the dryer, and drag it through to the living room, where we sit and sort. I start a pile for Daddy and a pile for Arthur and a pile for Mummy. Then there are piles for cloth wipes and for nappies and inserts. He will pile the wipes and inserts himself on the correct piles, but lately he has started pulling clothes out and holding them out to me with an "Uh?" question. I tell him, "That's Daddy's T-shirt! It goes on Daddy's pile!" and he will put it on the correct pile :) He loves when I push the basket from room to room, and spends plenty of his own time each day pushing, dragging and carrying the empty basket from kitchen to living room and back again!
He understands so many instructions now - that sounds weird but I can't figure out better wording! I mean, he can understand and act on two-part commands. Like if I say, "Go and get your drink and bring it to Mummy" then he will do it right away. Or if I say, "Where's your drink?" he will look around the room for it. If it's not there, he holds his palms up to sign "all gone", heh. It's so sweet. He looks so concerned at the same time :) So I tell him, "Your drink is on the chair in the kitchen" and he goes straight to the chair in the kitchen and gets his drink. He has a play toaster and loves popping the toast in and out! When it was time for his bath with Daddy one evening this week, he was playing with the toaster and when Neil said it was bath time, he got up with the plastic toast still in his hand and toddled eagerly to the stairs, ready for his bath. I called out to him and said, "Can you put the toast back first, Arthur?" and he actually stopped, looked at the toast in his hand, and walked back to the toaster and put it in, before going back to the stairs! He is getting much better at things like that. I think he can understand pretty much everything we say at the moment. He understands and responds to soooo much but doesn't really say much at all yet. He will choose between two things if I offer him the choice. Like he has two coats, one beige and one navy. I hold the two out to him and ask him which coat he wants to wear, and he usually picks navy :) I do the same with his bibs, and he likes to choose which one he wears.
If I split all his plastic fruit and veg into their two halves and mix them up, he now likes to play a match-them-up game. He picks one piece out and I ask him where the other part is, and he searches the pile with such an earnest expression, and finds the other half :) It's so exciting doing new things with him as he learns and expands his knowledge of stuff!
He has made up his own sign for "please", which is the cutest thing! I don't know how he started doing it, and it's not something we ever do. It just seemed to be something he made up himself. I need to take a photo of him doing it, somehow. It's one I NEED a photographic record of, just because I know I'll be sad the day he stops doing it and it's just a memory! If he wants something, he points to it, but now instead of just pointing and saying, "Uh!" in a demanding or questioning tone, he does this funny little clasp of his hands with one on top of the other, at the same time as shrugging his shoulders right up to his ears and grinning his most winning smile, the type that makes his nose wrinkle up :) If he asks for something and I ask him if he would like the whatever-it-is, he does his please sign then too :) I love it! I will try to get a photo.
Okay there is sure to be a ton more but I have got the WORST indigestion and can't sit here any longer! Plus it's late so I should get some sleep when my tummy gives me a break! My morning sickness seems to be back somewhat lately, which is a bit sucky, but oh well. It's Mother's Day today, and Neil forgot. I don't tend to make anything of Mother's Day because my mum never did. So I shouldn't expect anything! But I guess lately I feel sooooo tired and pushed to the end of my own limits, purely as a result of being a mother! And I guess it would have been nice to be congratulated or something for being a mother today, as a result. Instead I had to remind Neil to ring his own mother (who DOES do Mother's Day!)! I felt kind of silly about it earlier, but there's really no reason to. I am a blessed mama all the time, even when it's hard work! I have a precious little boy who snuggles with me and loves my presence still, and a tiny hiccupy squirmy boy who I get to have the joy of meeting and doing it all again with, in just a couple of months! I have a lovely, kind, scatterbrained husband, haha! ;) And lovely Meg whose Happy Mother's Day message today really cheered me up :) Thanks Meg! xx Happy Mother's Day to all the UK mummies!
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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