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Thursday 29 September 2011

Grandparents.....helpful?!!!!!!

Well, I am lucky that my parents help out with childcare 2 days a week.  My dad is now fully retired but mum still works some days.  My dad says he'd find it hard to cope with the two of them together, so he has one of them at a time.  It's lovely that they have a special relationship - my grandparents lived overseas so I missed out. BUT - why can't they stick to the way we're trying to bring up the kids?!!! I understand that they want to give them the odd treat - fine - but not constantly!!! And they refuse to say 'no' - ever.  (don't know why - they said no to me enough times!)  Honestly, I'm not being ungrateful but filling dd up with sweets and chocolate and letting her watch as much TV as she wants is really not the way forward.  But also childcare is so expensive in the UK, I don't feel like we have a choice.  I sound like a cow don't I!!!!!!

Also the nursery phoned about ds saying that I needed to collect him as he had chickenpox.  A visit to the doctors later, and it's just an eczema flare-up. Probably due to the random weather we've been having this week.  I feel bad about leaving my colleagues in the lurch but I really didn't have a choice.

Lots more interest in my website www.babyclothesandmore.co.uk so keep clicking on, you mums out there!!!  Will need to stock up myself on more lovely organic baby clothes for ds, they seem to really help with his eczema.

Wednesday 28 September 2011

DD learns to swim

Well I am pleased to report that dd has finally learnt to swim, just before her 4th birthday! Now this might sound quite young, and I am definitely not being one of those 'competitive mums' (who I hate!) - but this is after weekly lessons since the age of 4 months, through baby swimming classes such as Aqua babies and Puddle ducks and the lessons at my local gym.  I decided to get her swimming early as my husband had a fear of water from a young age (finally learning to swim at 37!!!) and I wanted her to always be water confident and safe.  However it has not been an easy journey - at the age of about 2 she decided she didn't want to follow the lessons and either did the opposite of what she was being asked to do, or else threw a tantrum! I think they also suddenly become aware that actually you can sink in water....and it becomes scary for a short time.  I stuck with it though, and changed her to lessons where she could be independent (ie not with parents in the water) and she came out the other side, regained her confidence and we finally persuaded her to let go and swim (with me walking backwards very slowly...) The swim discs helped gain her confidence too - going from 2 to 1 now none!  If anyone wants to know more about my experiences please get in touch.

Am absolutely shattered, ds decided to wake up at 5 today, down his bottle and a giant bowl of porridge and half a banana, throw some of it back up and then go to sleep....all by half 6. Great.  Then had a full day at work, aaargh! At least my website http://www.babyclothesandmore.co.uk/ is still doing well, the breastfeeding covers are really popular!

Friday 23 September 2011

Thank goodness it's the weekend - no lie in of course...

Well it's been a hectic work at work as usual.  Had a phone call from the nursery - ds teething so time to hit the Calpol! Or is he growth spurting - awake at half 5 this morning starving, great!  He's getting jealous every time he sees us eating, even if he's just finished his tea, honestly he's a food monster at the moment! DD seemed to enjoy her tea tonight, nice to actually get time to sit down as a family and have a meal together, wish we could do it more often! Yay weekend now - kids clubs and catching up with friends.  Time to check my website www.babyclothesandmore.co.uk     - mums with eczematic babies (like me!) are benefiting from the lovely organic clothes.

Monday 19 September 2011

Crazy kids at playgroup and confusing school aplications

Hi, this is my first post! My day off today - took my two kids (dd nearly 4, ds nearly1) to our local Surestart but honestly, all the kids were wild today, don't know what got into them. DD had to have a bit of a sit on the naughty step when we got back.  Been looking into applying for schools, seems like they don't release the open day dates until you 'register an interest', what's that about?! Made gingerbread shapes with dd which seemed to calm her down, ds spent the afternoon crawling round and refusing to sleep, I don't care as long as he sleeps at night! Hectic evening sorting out the slow cooker food for tomorrow and butties etc - back to work in the morning.
Website still doing ok - lots of mums starting to click on now (hurrah!)
www.babyclothesandmore.co.uk