Tuesday, February 24
This blog has moved!
Hacked again by babyfather
Go to: 'babymother' for further installments in the life of babe.
Hacked again by babyfather
Go to: 'babymother' for further installments in the life of babe.
Wednesday, February 18
Never again...
20 weeks
...will I interrupt babe's precious sleep - especially that 3 hour stint in the morning - for the frivolous purpose of meeting friends.
Spent the rest of the day picking up the pieces. Eating and sleeping out of the window. Hers and ours.
20 weeks
...will I interrupt babe's precious sleep - especially that 3 hour stint in the morning - for the frivolous purpose of meeting friends.
Spent the rest of the day picking up the pieces. Eating and sleeping out of the window. Hers and ours.
Tuesday, February 17
Morning has broken
20 weeks soon
Babe slept til 6.50am, very civilized, but as usual I have been up since 5am...
I woke up from a dream about someone eating in our bedroom to realise that the cat was washing herself noisily right next to the bed. This is her sly way of telling me it's time for breakfast without actually jumping on me. Then I had to get up because I was parched. Then I thought I'd feed the cat while I was in the kitchen (no doubt waking up CB whose room is next to the kitchen). In walking past the nursery I must have made a noise, because once I was in the kitchen I heard a bit of an eruption - babe can do this in her sleep - so I sprinted quietly back to our room to shut the door on sleeping babyfather, who was starting to huff and puff under the duvet. I was thoroughly awake by this time and realised I couldn't possibly go back to sleep without a large bowl of muesli, which I ate as quietly as I could on the landing. Then, all having returned to quiet, I crept back to bed.
Just as I was drifting off the peace was shattered by the cat vomiting loudly in the bedroom doorway.
As this noise subsided, the special rubbish collection for the care home next door turned up, roaring and clanking. By then it was ten past six and any further attempts at sleep were useless.
Whew
Must remember to put the brake on the pushchair before I let go of it. Especially when on a slope leading to a busy road.
20 weeks soon
Babe slept til 6.50am, very civilized, but as usual I have been up since 5am...
I woke up from a dream about someone eating in our bedroom to realise that the cat was washing herself noisily right next to the bed. This is her sly way of telling me it's time for breakfast without actually jumping on me. Then I had to get up because I was parched. Then I thought I'd feed the cat while I was in the kitchen (no doubt waking up CB whose room is next to the kitchen). In walking past the nursery I must have made a noise, because once I was in the kitchen I heard a bit of an eruption - babe can do this in her sleep - so I sprinted quietly back to our room to shut the door on sleeping babyfather, who was starting to huff and puff under the duvet. I was thoroughly awake by this time and realised I couldn't possibly go back to sleep without a large bowl of muesli, which I ate as quietly as I could on the landing. Then, all having returned to quiet, I crept back to bed.
Just as I was drifting off the peace was shattered by the cat vomiting loudly in the bedroom doorway.
As this noise subsided, the special rubbish collection for the care home next door turned up, roaring and clanking. By then it was ten past six and any further attempts at sleep were useless.
Whew
Must remember to put the brake on the pushchair before I let go of it. Especially when on a slope leading to a busy road.
Sunday, February 15
The fingers get busier
Favourite toy: two wooden frogs which spin round the top of a music box to the tune of Swan Lake. She studies them with furious concentration, fingers fluttering all over the place, before knocking them onto the floor.
Watching her use her hands reminds me of trying to do a delicate operation wearing a very thick pair of gloves. The fingers don't quite go where you intend them to. It looks frustrating at times. Still, it must be rewarding to get babyfather picking the same toy off the floor for you three times in as many minutes.
Favourite toy: two wooden frogs which spin round the top of a music box to the tune of Swan Lake. She studies them with furious concentration, fingers fluttering all over the place, before knocking them onto the floor.
Watching her use her hands reminds me of trying to do a delicate operation wearing a very thick pair of gloves. The fingers don't quite go where you intend them to. It looks frustrating at times. Still, it must be rewarding to get babyfather picking the same toy off the floor for you three times in as many minutes.
Cybermum
19 weeks and some
The blog has suffered because I have discovered 'mumsnet'. It allows you to post your inane new-mum questions and get bombarded with concerned old-mum responses. I'm hooked.
I had another panic at the end of last week about breastfeeding the babe. The feeding policy has changed daily. We've had top-ups with formula, starting her on solids (again), expressing breast milk to top her up in the evening, back where we started with just breastfeeding and the intention of staying off solids til 6 months, to more top-ups with formula. It all depended on whose advice I heard last. I was running in circles phoning friends, talking to breastfeeding counsellors, the health visitor, posting mumsnet, and least helpfully of all reading Gina Ford (The Fascist Little Mother Book). Health visitors say wean her, she's 4 months. But the World Health Organisation and the Association of Breastfeeding Mothers say wait til 6 months. Gina Ford says keep her in a strict routine of 4-hourly feeds. The breastfeeding mafiosa say feed on demand to build your milk supply and never give formula.
At the end of all this I looked at babe, she smiled back at me, and I realised what a gorgeous little girl she is. She's the picture of health, her default is set to 'happy', she sleeps for Britain and I love her. So what exactly is the problem? I have now resolved to enjoy my baby no matter what (and avoid extremist ideology).
19 weeks and some
The blog has suffered because I have discovered 'mumsnet'. It allows you to post your inane new-mum questions and get bombarded with concerned old-mum responses. I'm hooked.
I had another panic at the end of last week about breastfeeding the babe. The feeding policy has changed daily. We've had top-ups with formula, starting her on solids (again), expressing breast milk to top her up in the evening, back where we started with just breastfeeding and the intention of staying off solids til 6 months, to more top-ups with formula. It all depended on whose advice I heard last. I was running in circles phoning friends, talking to breastfeeding counsellors, the health visitor, posting mumsnet, and least helpfully of all reading Gina Ford (The Fascist Little Mother Book). Health visitors say wean her, she's 4 months. But the World Health Organisation and the Association of Breastfeeding Mothers say wait til 6 months. Gina Ford says keep her in a strict routine of 4-hourly feeds. The breastfeeding mafiosa say feed on demand to build your milk supply and never give formula.
At the end of all this I looked at babe, she smiled back at me, and I realised what a gorgeous little girl she is. She's the picture of health, her default is set to 'happy', she sleeps for Britain and I love her. So what exactly is the problem? I have now resolved to enjoy my baby no matter what (and avoid extremist ideology).
Thursday, February 12
Phew
19 weeks, 1 day and still alive
Must stop dashing behind reversing cars with the pushchair.
19 weeks, 1 day and still alive
Must stop dashing behind reversing cars with the pushchair.
Wednesday, February 11
Little fingers
19 weeks
It's true that you get used to doing everything with one hand, especially with a baby that needs keeping upright for a while after feeding. I've been carrying babe around with one hand and doing all sorts of dexterous things with the other since the start. Babe isn't one to allow herself just to be baggage, however. Once she learnt that the routine was pick her up, go to the kitchen, get the Gaviscon from the fridge, warm it up, carry it to the front room and feed her, she has made her feelings known when I deviate from that routine. She watches everything like a hawk and if I do something irrelevant such as walk into the wrong room / pick up something that isn't her bottle / start a conversation, she lets out an indignant shriek. There's been a new factor for the last three weeks or so too; I'll be getting a CD out of its cover to put in the player and suddenly find that the cover is being held by one big hand and two tiny ones. Anything I'm holding, she wants to hold too. This is quite useful, especially so because at this age babies are better at grasping than letting go. So if I carry her into the bedroom to fetch a clean bib, I can give it to her to carry wherever we're going next. Like a sort of cute portable clothespeg.
19 weeks
It's true that you get used to doing everything with one hand, especially with a baby that needs keeping upright for a while after feeding. I've been carrying babe around with one hand and doing all sorts of dexterous things with the other since the start. Babe isn't one to allow herself just to be baggage, however. Once she learnt that the routine was pick her up, go to the kitchen, get the Gaviscon from the fridge, warm it up, carry it to the front room and feed her, she has made her feelings known when I deviate from that routine. She watches everything like a hawk and if I do something irrelevant such as walk into the wrong room / pick up something that isn't her bottle / start a conversation, she lets out an indignant shriek. There's been a new factor for the last three weeks or so too; I'll be getting a CD out of its cover to put in the player and suddenly find that the cover is being held by one big hand and two tiny ones. Anything I'm holding, she wants to hold too. This is quite useful, especially so because at this age babies are better at grasping than letting go. So if I carry her into the bedroom to fetch a clean bib, I can give it to her to carry wherever we're going next. Like a sort of cute portable clothespeg.
Saturday, February 7
Colic and panic
4 months and a bit
You can be sure that if the blog goes quiet for a bit, the babe hasn't been.
Her evenings have been pretty unsettled for the last 4 weeks, then from Wednesday they all went horribly wrong - lots of discomfort and screaming after feeds - and all of Thursday she had diarrhoea accompanied by more screaming. I am slightly embarrassed to admit that I have used the out-of-hours doctors' service twice since then, once by phone and once in person, and been to North Middlesex A & E. I hasten to add I only went to A & E because I was trying to use the NHS 'walk-in service'. It turned out to be the NHS stand-around service, where after about 15 minutes in a queue I was told to go next door to A & E because I had a child under a year old. Accident and Emergency was as close to one of the circles of hell as I can imagine without actually bothering to read Dante. It was dimly lit and full of restrained suffering including more queuing (a sort of English flavour of hell). The woman queuing in front of me had to be held in a standing position by her partner and by the time she was called in to see the doctor she was crouching on the floor. Babe, embarrassingly enough, was all chirpy and the picture of health.
Finally, in the children's A & E department a fed-up nurse told me that all the doctors had just changed over to start a new three-month rotation, none of them knew what they were doing yet, everything was taking ages, they all had less experience than a GP, and if she were me she'd go home. Which I did, after a surreal conversation with a blond Irish woman whose one-year-old had asthma, about whether breast feeding made your boobs ugly or not.
Finally a nice, plump, bearded, Greek doctor told me today that babe probably has colic as well as reflux and I should give her fennel tea.
4 months and a bit
You can be sure that if the blog goes quiet for a bit, the babe hasn't been.
Her evenings have been pretty unsettled for the last 4 weeks, then from Wednesday they all went horribly wrong - lots of discomfort and screaming after feeds - and all of Thursday she had diarrhoea accompanied by more screaming. I am slightly embarrassed to admit that I have used the out-of-hours doctors' service twice since then, once by phone and once in person, and been to North Middlesex A & E. I hasten to add I only went to A & E because I was trying to use the NHS 'walk-in service'. It turned out to be the NHS stand-around service, where after about 15 minutes in a queue I was told to go next door to A & E because I had a child under a year old. Accident and Emergency was as close to one of the circles of hell as I can imagine without actually bothering to read Dante. It was dimly lit and full of restrained suffering including more queuing (a sort of English flavour of hell). The woman queuing in front of me had to be held in a standing position by her partner and by the time she was called in to see the doctor she was crouching on the floor. Babe, embarrassingly enough, was all chirpy and the picture of health.
Finally, in the children's A & E department a fed-up nurse told me that all the doctors had just changed over to start a new three-month rotation, none of them knew what they were doing yet, everything was taking ages, they all had less experience than a GP, and if she were me she'd go home. Which I did, after a surreal conversation with a blond Irish woman whose one-year-old had asthma, about whether breast feeding made your boobs ugly or not.
Finally a nice, plump, bearded, Greek doctor told me today that babe probably has colic as well as reflux and I should give her fennel tea.
Monday, February 2
Family, shedloads of,
4 calendar months
The babe has been to Wales this weekend for some adoration from the rellies.
Babyfather and I left her for the first time in the care of someone else, on two occasions, during the course of the weekend. The someone elses were the capable Nanny and Noo Noo, but nonetheless I managed to have palpitations when I was meant to be enjoying some shopping. The increasing volume of milk I was carrying about was not helping, but mainly it was separation anxiety, which I thought only happened to the child part of the equation.
Babe coped well with the large numbers of people (who she'd already met but probably were strangers as far as she was concerned). Welsh Babycousin is a firm favourite, being of the small variety (five and three quarters). She grabbed his nose, much to her own amusement. He is now an expert at replacing her dummy and hosted his own radio show over the baby monitor.
4 calendar months
The babe has been to Wales this weekend for some adoration from the rellies.
Babyfather and I left her for the first time in the care of someone else, on two occasions, during the course of the weekend. The someone elses were the capable Nanny and Noo Noo, but nonetheless I managed to have palpitations when I was meant to be enjoying some shopping. The increasing volume of milk I was carrying about was not helping, but mainly it was separation anxiety, which I thought only happened to the child part of the equation.
Babe coped well with the large numbers of people (who she'd already met but probably were strangers as far as she was concerned). Welsh Babycousin is a firm favourite, being of the small variety (five and three quarters). She grabbed his nose, much to her own amusement. He is now an expert at replacing her dummy and hosted his own radio show over the baby monitor.
