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2006-10-19 - 11.49pm previous entry next entry
Lots_of_photos_and_other_things
Finally a moment to write an entry!!! Thanks so much for all the helpful suggestions on getting the house cleaned up! And all the other lovely comments too :) I have a wonder-husband. We talked and he decided that to get the house sorted, that is, in a state where it's easier to maintain the tidiness, he is going to spend 3 evenings a week cleaning the house. Every week, till it's done. And I'm not to worry about it. Isn't he fab? He does Monday, Wednesday and Friday after the boys are in bed, for a couple of hours each time, and now we can see nearly the whole of the kitchen floor!! Yay! I love my hubble.
I have fifty million photos to post, but first I have a few things that I've been itching to just WRITE here, some boring but just-because, and some newsy and normal. Matthew is kind of stirry and it's late, so I'll just get right on and try bullet-pointing!
1) What is up with the trees?! It's the second half of October and the trees are still green green greeeen and full of leaves. Driving down the road today I was still under a thick shady cover of trees! I remember three years ago the trees were BARE by now. Cameron's funeral was October 6th and the leaves pretty much all fell off the trees the week before. Any left were brown. So weird to still be all summery green! Today was cooler and wet and windy though, so maybe autumn is finally kicking in?
2) See, see, seeeeee the first ever pictures of my new baby nephice/neiphew!!!
Sarah is now 12 weeks pregnant, well, 11 weeks and 6 days. I am just sooooo excited, WAY more than I expected to be! They are calling the baby "Little Pip" right now - HOW cute is that?! :) Is it really bad that I feel so much more excited about Little Pip than I did when Ella was on the way? It feels wrong because Little Pip is my very own flesh and blood and Ella is not (she's Neil's) - I WAS excited about Ella but I'm surprised at how much more so I feel about my very own baby brother waiting on his own little Pip! I would never play favourites, of course I wouldn't. I am just so so excited to meet this little one! I can't wait to see if he/she looks like my brother much. I love my brother. They have no hunches yet, but I say it's a girl, purely because it would be just typical that Neil and I bear like TEN boys and no girls, and everyone else in the family has the girls! ;) I love having boys though!
3) Arthur is talking and talking and TALKING these days! Nearly everything he says is a two-word phrase, which suddenly exploded into being in the last week. Before that he was saying the odd two-word phrase and everything else was a single word. Or two single words, but said very separately. Three times today he tried to say a big long sentence (four or five words) when he was eager to tell me something, but every time he just fell over his words and fumbled over the order and the pronounciation so it was impossible to understand him! He got a bit frustrated about it, but I know he's going to be on proper sentences in no time, the way he's trying so hard. Today is the first time he's even tried it. A few examples of his latest two-word phrases are: "Make pile" (when folding laundry), "Daw wist" (draw list - when helping me write a shopping list!), "Whollld towel" (fold towel), "Wop Pubbies" (watch Teletubbies), "Ligh' on" (switch the light on please), "See-yee Daddy" (silly Daddy!), "Piece fall" (when a piece of his toast fell onto the floor). He also says "more ____ " a million times a day, nearly always for food - the boy is SO ravenous at all times since his nasty bug! He just asks for food constantly, I don't know what to do with him! He remains ultra picky though, about what he'll actually eat, so he's usually specific about what he wants more of - "More shee-yoo" (cereal), "More toas'", "More bip-bit" (biscuit!), "More mah-bam" (gingerbread man), etc. He also starts LOTS of his two-word phrases with his word for Matthew, "Ma-Ma" :) He LOVES Matthew, and now that he's really starting to speak, he talks about him a lot. He tells me what he sees Matthew doing: "Ma-Ma, woal" (roll), "Ma-Ma stink!" (if he's farted or pooed audibly, haha!), "Ma-Ma pull!" if Matthew has Arthur's finger and is pulling on it. And he likes to just lie with Matthew and point out parts of him to me: "Ma-Ma eeear.... Ma-Ma hair.... Ma-Ma nee-noop (sleepsuit)" etc. He loves to look out of the bedroom window over to the main road where there are cars and buses and stuff going by. He will literally stay there for like an HOUR, but usually I can only give him 20 minutes or so before I have to lift him down to go and do something else. He LOVES cars and vehicles of any sort. Anyway, he'll spend that whole 20 minutes just commenting on every single thing he sees. I just listen to him - it's so cute! He says, "Car!.... Blue car!.... Ohh, reh car (red).... Ooooh! Why wan (white van).... YAH-YAH!!!! (lorry).... Beeeb yah-yah! (big lorry).... OH BUS!!.... Oh?.... No car....Gone?.... Oh CAR! Lellow car!.... Waymee car (navy car)...." etc. He also comments on bikes and people a bit, but definitely prefers the motors! Yesterday he said, "beeb reh bus!" (big red bus) which was his first real 3-word sentence. He also understands "two". If he sees two lorries go by one behind the other, he says (very excitedly) "Ohhh TWO yah-yah!" and today he found two coins in my bag and held them out to me saying, "TWO mummee (money)!" He is VERY excited about the number two right now!
4) Arthur is doing lots better after his bug. He threw up again once at bedtime a few nights ago which was mightily depressing after thinking he was over it all. But he's been fine since and I'm inclined to believe he had just had tooooo much food on his empty system all at once or something. He really is putting away near-adult portions at the moment. I hardly know whether to let him or not, since he did throw up that time after a lot of food. I don't know whether he can "self-regulate" or not! But then if I cap his meals he just asks and asks and ASKS for food. Although he does that anyway, even when he has clearly finished his meal! He just starts asking again after maybe 15 minutes and doesn't stop till the next snack or meal. So anyway, he is better, yay!
5) We went to Fellowship Group this morning - our first outing in a couple of weeks, since before his bug. It was at Fellowship Group 2 weeks ago that he caught the gastroenteritis. It was GOOD to get out and see people! We had to consider him potentially infectious again when he vomited, as it's just not fair to risk giving that horrible thing to anyone else, so we have had to stay in this week too, until yesterday. We just went supermarket shopping yesterday though.
6) No money left AGAIN. Urgh. We can't buy food till next Thursday, which um, no. Because milk and bread are not going to last a week, so at the very least we'll need those. I think we'll have to put a little on that darn credit card again (the one we were supposed to chop up months ago).
7) I have been downloading music (for the first time - go me!) over the last week. We've been meaning to sign up and do that for ages, and I thought if I could download my favourite songs and some feel-good songs then I could very quickly pick my spirits up with music :) It's working GREAT! I am listening to stuff from the good old 80's that I haven't heard for YEARS, stuff that just gives me a lift somehow. Natalie Cole's "Pink Cadillac", Boy Meets Girl's "Waiting for a star to fall", and Jefferson Starship's "We built this city" amongst others. The world is just ROSY while I'm listening to those :) I am also slllllowly making a montage of some photos to music, as I've seen people doing that for a while at a couple of forums I visit. It seems to be all the rage at the moment, but I really like the idea. I never have time so it's going slowly! I'll post it here if I ever finish it.
I forget what number I'm on, so I think that's probably enough waffle for now! Photo time! I have sooooo many to catch up on, but Matthew's have been waiting the longest, so here are some of my sweet tiny man - who is somehow FOUR months old now, and who today just started transferring things from one hand to the other for the first time :) Yay Matthew! Anyway, photos!
Conked out on the floor while Arthur was ill, poor lovey! Sometimes he went a bit... not neglected, but, you know. Overlooked maybe. Arthur was so poorly and needy. Matthew was SO incredibly good and laid-back about it all. He made it so easy for us to look after poor Arthur. He's such a lovely boy!
Sweet boy!! Now a few of Arthur! I am working on exposing him to a more varied diet at the moment. I am actually COOKING (wow, hehe!) at last, and making him new things, but he rolls phlegm at the back of his throat and makes a disgusted face at everything I offer him other than baked beans, cheese sandwiches and anything sweet! I started at the beginning of the week once he was better and on a normal diet again, and I'm persevering! I'll keep it up for a while. If he doesn't eat it, he doesn't get anything else instead, but he always gets offered a pudding. I try to make it nutritious, especially if he's been offered a meal that I knew he'd refuse. Fruit, mostly, or yoghurt. I am going to start cooking some desserts too, and I am making blueberry muffins tomorrow :)
Anyway, we are getting a lot of big tantrums with this attempt! The biggest one lasted an hour and a half (!!) over macaroni cheese! I told him I was going to make his lunch, and that we were having macaroni cheese. He looked suspicious, and so I explained that macaroni cheese was pasta with a cheese sauce. I said we'd have peas with it too (he likes peas, and cheese for that matter). He immediately did this:
And then screamed and sobbed and threw himself around while I cheerfully cooked his lunch and served it up. He somehow notched it up a gear once he was sat at the table with some very nice macaroni cheese with peas in front of him in his favourite Teletubbies bowl, and all but threw his bowl and mine off the table! I stayed calm and cheerful and ate my food at as normal a pace as I could manage, encouraging him to try some all the while. He did try to separate a pea from the rest, but went into renewed screaming and crying when he couldn't wipe enough of the cheese sauce off it for his liking! After I'd eaten mine, I cheerfully took his bowl away and cheerfully offered him pudding (note the consistency of the CHEERFUL factor - apparently very important in the whole process, but rather hard work in practise!). He hungrily ate a yoghurt and a gingerbread man, and then asked for more food, but that was the end of lunch so I got him down from the table. He threw himself on the living room floor and tantrummed himself out until he literally fell asleep on the floor!! Soooo unlike Arthur to sleep easily, hehe!
All this time he had also been asking for milk, but I am currently refusing him milk outside of nap and bedtimes, and first thing in the morning. I SO don't want to wean him, but I do want him to get the message that he needs to try some other foods and eat them if he's hungry, rather than me putting all this effort in with the food and him just deciding that if I'm not going to give him the food he wants, he'll just fill up on my milk thank you very much! I wouldn't mind him filling up on my milk once he's eating more of a variety of foods, except that it is so incredibly exhausting breastfeeding two children. But I do plan to let him increase his milk feeds once he's interested in more foods. Anyway, in the end I nursed Matthew and then woke Arthur up to take him to bed and give him his nap-milk. He was more than willing, bless him! He had over an hour for his nap - long for Arthur - and was MUCH happier when he woke, see?
Today one of his new foods was something I knew he'd like :) I LOVE the recipe book I have about feeding babies and toddlers. It's so relaxed and encouraging. The recipes are lovely and easy - I will SO be starting from this book with Matthew once he starts solids. And I like how the author says not to be paranoid about certain foods like so many people are. Sweet foods are important - high fat ones too - for toddlers. Not pure sugar candies, but a sweet pudding with every meal is what she advises. She says to see them as another opportunity to get nutrients into children - a milky pudding is a great source of calcium and protein. I love how she says there's nothing wrong with giving children things like brownies because cocoa contains flavonoids that are important in their diet, and the nuts are very nutritious. If there's egg and milk in there too, even better. So I am making brownies tomorrow too, if I get time :) With that in mind, I decided to buy some Nutella (chocolate hazelnut spread) today at the supermarket, for Arthur to try. It's one of those things I've always mentally thrown up my hands in horror at, giving a child chocolate spread on bread!! It just seemed an awful thing to do! But I looked at the ingredients and yes there is sugar in it, but also cocoa and hazelnuts, which is actually more nutritious than a LOT of stuff you might put on toast. Also, there is this huge hype about sugar which I do not buy. I mean, some people have a very good reason to cut out sugar, for health reasons. But there really isn't SO much wrong with sugar as it seems. Sugar REPLACEMENTS on the other hand, now that's a different story. Sucralose, aspartame, etc, are potentially even dangerous for every day use. I know that research is still being done, but they are considered potentially carcinogenic!! As in, cancer-causing. They were invented for use as part of a carefully controlled diet in DIABETICS only, not for the general public or every day use, and I had to be careful about whether things contained aspartame during pregnancy as safety can't be confirmed for the baby! Yikes! I also avoid it while breastfeeding. But I have to say, I am NO hurry to put that crap in my body. Sugar for me please! It bugs me so much that it's now hard to find fruit squashes and drinks that I like without aspartame or sucralose added. Why can't I find one with just plain SUGAR?!!! Tsk. I reckon sugar is waaay better for my body, so long as I regulate my own intake.
Oh dear, a rant. Sorry! Getting back to my point (!!), I bought some Nutella and asked Arthur if he would like some on toast for tea. He gave it a suspicious look but I showed him and asked him what it was, and he peered into the jar and said, after a pause, "Cuck-uk (chocolate)!" I asked him if he wanted to taste it, and he looked at me with huge shining eyes, like he couldn't believe I was actually offering it to him, hehe! He touched it and tasted his finger and then got SO excited about having it for tea that he bounced round the kitchen non-stop while I made his toast, shouting, "Cuck-uk, toas'! Cuck-uk, toas'!!" Hehehe, funny boy! Here he is enjoying it - see the kitchen FLOOR?! Still mucky, but hey, it's visible ;)
Okay, now to the photos of the boys together. It's soooo late. But worth it to finally get these all posted! Matthew is still asleep for now, but he'll wake in a minute for a feed. He's having a growth spurt lately, feeding 2-hourly-ish during the day and more wakeful at night. He also naps really badly during the day at the moment, urgh. It's such hard work with my boys over their sleep, I don't know why. Even though we've done it differently with each of them. I guess we just have children who aren't "easy" sleepers. I wish they were! It would make life SO much easier, but oh well. Matthew's body clock is set to wake him after 30 minutes during the day, exactly as Arthur's has always done. I am persevering MUCH more with Matthew than I did with Arthur though, because I know it eventually drove me out of my tree with Arthur and I don't want to repeat it! I am doing the pick-up-put-down method with Matthew. He cries a lot. It sucks. But he HAS to have more sleep than 30 minutes at a time. He is so cranky with 4 thirty minute naps per day, and incredibly happy and relaxed and cheerful if he manages an hour or two in a block. So I need to help him achieve it.
Anyway. How did I get onto that? Oh yes, he'll be waking any second! I'd better hurry up! Pictures of the boys - there are LOADS. They love each other SO much! It's so lovely to see. Lately Arthur is playing with Matthew a lot more. He's more interesting now that he's rolling around everywhere and stuffing toys into his mouth with increasingly accurate co-ordination. Also Matthew is LONGING for Arthur to pay him attention. When he finally does, Matthew "talks" and smiles and blows raspberries, and everything in his reportoire, to impress his favourite brother! So that is starting to please Arthur and they lie on the floor together a lot just looking at each other. It has meant a few heart-breaking moments where Matthew has hurt Arthur by accident because he doesn't know that kicking or scrunching hurts - he's just tiny and curious and feeling things out with his newly controlled limbs. Arthur becomes absolutely distraught if Matthew hurts him. He tries to act like it was a game at first and then when it really does hurt he just starts to cry and sob and says, "Hurt! Ma-Ma, kick!" and asks for "cuggoo" from me. He is so upset about it that I can't console him at all for a while, poor precious. It breaks my heart, because I see how very much Arthur loves Matthew and therefore how much he is crushed when he gets hurt, even by accident. He's still so little that he can't really understand even when I explain, and I just want to hold him so close that he becomes part of me again and my heart aches for him fit to burst. It's especially heart-breaking when they were having a fun "game" and Arthur was so happy and giggling one minute and then he got hurt in the midst of that :(
Anyway. Here is Arthur finding it very funny to put his head under Matthew's bottom and have Matthew kick him repeatedly! He found this funny for ages, but it did end in that heart-scrunchingly sad way that I mentioned above, when he got too hard a kick to his head. I did suggest that he move because Matthew didn't know how to kick gently yet, and he might get hurt, but he insisted on continuing the "game". Poor Arthur!
Here are some more of Arthur just enjoying his brother :)
And finally, a few that I took today which I LOVE. I was changing Matthew's nappy and Arthur lay down next to him, but upside-down to him, just to look into his face for a while. Matthew loved this and after a while they just went very calm and quiet and stared and stared into each other's eyes. I can't tell you how it made me feel. I took a few photos:
My little boys just LOVE each other. They are just the most precious little people. Ever. I'm so blessed.
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