ILX Parenting 3: Back In (Potty) Training

Self as scourge of the strollerphobes.....with still-spoon-brandishing Oliver.

http://photos-d.ak.facebook.com/photos-ak-sf2p/v159/213/42/619069358/n619069358_451023_4568.jpg

That sure looks like a cosy stroller.

beeps becomes more and more fun everyday and she was fun to begin with! well, maybe not so much the first 3 or 4 weeks (ha).

i <3 this kid!

http://img444.imageshack.us/img444/6044/beepsatstarliteagainqx0.jpg

Aw.

Oh Sunny, she's so cute. I want to kiss her little cheeks! So sweet. Damn - it's official, I totally want a kid. Sadly, it won't happen for another three years so I'll just ooh and aah over yours until then.

I forgot to post pictures of the boys' first birthday party...

Eating their cupcakes. Note the difference in styles (Ben on right):
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2284/1958820339_c74620fa0a.jpg

Playing with their loot:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2361/1959421640_6d7bfa99eb.jpg

it won't happen for another three years

Talk about long-term planning!

(Besides, ENBB, you have to remember they eventually become snotty teenagers who trash your car and say you don't understand them, and mope in their room listening to Morrissey CDs...that they stole from you.)

And then a few from Thanksgiving, paying with their aunt:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2251/2055188115_1b7d8b4943.jpg

Peekaboo!
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2363/2055974196_5e3f045e51.jpg

Owen looks on happily:
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2263/2055969100_5904426fbe.jpg

x-post I meant at least another three years, ha - and yeah, I know it's not all cuteness and light but damn, ILXORs make some cute kids!

I don't remember any of this. (2xpost)

I don't either. My sister apparently made up for it.

Well, god damn it, now I know how Liesje got thrush: I have thrush as well. No fucking fun.

Oh man. Get well soon, all of you. What a horrible situation.

Yeah, it suxors. :-( But I'm sure we'll survive. :-) It's just minor bumps really. :-)

http://vassifer.blogs.com/photos/uncategorized/2007/11/24/oiver_2.jpeg

Ugh. The Thanksgiving holiday knocked everyone off their routines. Neither Charlotte nor Oliver were happy/comfortable sleeping at my Mom's place (waking up crying many times in the middle of the night, which means we had to take them in with us -- which means <i>no one</i> gets to sleep), and they're now frustratingly back to waking up at 6 am.

does this count as abuse?
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2098/1904750977_2729caa52b_m.jpg

sucking monkey brains
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2277/1950783762_58007ad485_m.jpg

old films be borin
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2141/1793625037_bbc6648095_m.jpg

Too much antiquated pop culture for that poor kid.

Haha, baby in Carter t-shirt = Best Thing Ever.

The chubby legs!

Alice has chickenpox after all :(

Oh, yuk, but (as I'm sure everybody has said ad nauseum) better now than later. Depending on the severity of the spots she may hardly notice. Our boy had them at about 1 years old and wasn't bothered at all. Just keep slathering on the cream...

Mae has complained that her photo isn't on here when Louis has 2. So...
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2294/2062564209_8f0a9a2b16.jpg

V cool!

yeah, so far Alice isn't bothered at all except that she's got a cough and snotty nose to go with the pox and that disturbs her sleep a bit. I'm glad she's having it now but I'm not looking foward to a boring fortnight of quarantine...

aw, sorry to hear about spotty quarantine, thrush and disturbed sleep in the group. we have the same problem with disturbed routine when we take a family trip to wallasey and it takes so long to get back to what passes for a loose normal routine in our house. lulu is the only one who gets any shuteye on these trips, she can sack out anywhere and has a travel cot to herself, but the rest of us sleep in twin beds pushed together and ava spends most of every night falling out of bed if she's on the outside, and falling down in the crack between the beds if she's on the inside. I'm too busy worrying about potential broken noggin/suffocation to sleep.

we've had our first new walker injury involving blood, yikes. lulu tripped over her own feet and fell face-first at speed into the side of the toy box. I knew it was going to happen at some point but it was alarming nonetheless, I thought she'd really hurt her eye because it was covered in blood! but it turns out she'd just busted her lip a little and brushed the blood on her eye. within a couple of minutes she was padding around and smiling again.

I love pictures of kids with statues. we always drove by a statue in a roundabout on the way to visit my grandparents in virginia, and for years when we were young my dad had us convinced that we were looking at a statue of him, built by the town for services to the community. it's a great comedy lie to tell your kids and if we ever drive by any statues of women I'm so going to carry on the tradition. it's no wonder that a few years later we didn't believe dad when he told us film star joseph cotten had been their paper boy, but that was apparently true.

who's getting excited about christmas with the kids? I know I am!

i'm exited about the future: i have heard that older babies sleep through the night. ;-) *sigh* i had my first "crash 'n' burn day" yesterday. i had a gigantic headache (as i can't stand warm bedrooms). :-((((

http://vassifer.blogs.com/photos/uncategorized/2007/11/26/photo_19_3.jpg

Oliver and I this morning....much earlier than I'd have preferred.

oliver's such a cutie that I bet he's immediately forgiven for his choice of way-too-early quality time!

don't despair nathalie, sleep will be yours again. and then right when you get used to it with the baby, a demon toddler will snatch it away again, ha! ava is stubbornly refusing to crash out till midnight these days. it's our fault because we kept her out/up late for a couple of parties one weekend when a good friend was visiting from the states and since then she's decided she likes the late-night lifestyle, urgh. on the upside, she slept till 9:30 this morning. the thing is she forgot to tell lulu we were all having a lie-in!

Alice was still asleep when I left for work this morning, which was good but... weird. Quite possibly she'll be in bed when I get home too. Not sure I like the idea of her not seeing her mummy for a whole 24 hours :(

Did you know alice means anchovy in Italian?

No! I hate anchovies!

Since I became a full-time Dad, I am too exhausted to post. I am still here though, sort of.

PS: I like anchovies.

Oh well, at least she's not called Pippa.

So when did you guys start using the relax chair (bouncer chair)? We bought one when Ophelia was about two months, but I am wondering from when it's ok to use it. I don't wanna ruin Liesje's back.

We made it to Japan (& back)!

Here is M relaxing on the flight - she was sooo good; she hardly cried & slept enough for me to eat my lunch and have a few hours sleep myself.
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2323/1999039565_fe8fba8550_m.jpg

Here she is posing with a couple who owned a sushi restaurant in Hakone.
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2017/1999039619_e67dc22ba1_m.jpg

As predicted, she got lots of attention & we had a really great time.

Sorry to hear about all the illness that's been going about. I am dreading M's first bout of anything.

It's so rare we get a pic of them together - here's Ava giving Tallulah a head-rub (from appearances) or a haircut (Ava's own description):

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2236/2074185835_f0548412ab.jpg

She looks like she's trying to do the Vulcan mind-meld with her. Very cute.

Oliver seeing snow for the first time (well, first time as a reasonably cognitive, sentient being):

http://vassifer.blogs.com/photos/uncategorized/2007/12/02/img_6899_2.jpg

Nat, I didn't use the bouncer for a while as ours is a quite upright one with no headrest. I put him in it when he was about 4 weeks old, photo below, but didn't start using it regularly until about a month afterwards.

http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1209/1268951500_2d2d1f5857.jpg

I've been having a bit of a wearing time, Aidan's feeding's gone to pot, he's feeding every two hours at night, and some days it's every 1-2 hours during the day. It's not time to wean - he's only just 4 months and is paying no attention at all to us eating. If there'd been any formula in the house yesterday morning I'd have given him some, but he then went on to go 4 hours and then three hours between feeds, for no reason I can see whatsoever!

He's learnt how to roll from his back to his front, and so does it all the time now, he's trying to get up on his knees but I think we've got a while yet before he puts it all together and starts crawling! my favourite photo of late

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2200/2037540430_d83fd73ea5.jpg

Ah, the old four-month growth spurt -- I remember it well. Loads of people mistake it for readiness for weaning but, as you've worked out, it just means milk, milk and more milk. Don't worry, it will soon settle down again. I would always recommend co-sleeping as a way to get more rest at night while breastfeeding.

We have, reluctantly, been doing some sleep training this week. Figured that at nine months, and eating like a horse in the day (finally), it was time for the night feeds to go, and he wasn't gonna give them up without a bit of fuss. But actually it has been less stressful than I had feared. Last night (night 3) he slept through for the first time since he was about 12 weeks old. I went to bed at 9.30 and woke feeling like a new woman. Fingers crossed that continues...

Getting festive...
http://img265.imageshack.us/img265/8702/santababysmallhx7.jpg

Yeah. Our experience with the sleep training went much better than we thought it would, too. Basically one night of heartbreaking crying for 45 minutes, and then they got the picture for the next night.

All these kids are so beautiful. Makes me want to have 10 more. We never had to go through sleep training, thank god. We are experiencing a little dont stand up in the bath training right now though but that only involves mischievous looks which are hard to say no to without laughing.

Beeps just had her 9 month checkup. Her weight is in the 90th percentile and her height in the 97th which makes her the size of an average 12 month old! She also went from 2 to 8 teeth in the last month with number 9 coming close behind. Time for real food! Here she is at a Memphis Krystal Burger yesterday:

http://img210.imageshack.us/img210/6537/krystalnk7.jpg

http://img101.imageshack.us/img101/9748/krystalgm7.jpg

hey, that first one didnt show before. oh well, double Beeps.

Megan has become a fearless climber. This is where Mrs O found her yesterday:

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2405/2092591581_7900f3a6e5.jpg

Note that my wife's reaction wasn't "OMG Megan are you ok?" but "Haha where's the camera?"

This thread, and especially that last photo (OMG Omino, that is more than classic!) = ultimate cure for a bleak mood.

Well done, Megan!

I like that sink, by the way. I like the way it has little nooks in it to balance your fag on, like an ashtray.

Perhaps I will post a picture:

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2195/2080713204_0732b71866.jpg

Or two:

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2132/2079930071_25f7dc3a83.jpg

Meg, you were still nightfeeding at nine months?!? Once they pass the five kilos, babies don't need nocturnal feedings, the only reason they want it is for comfort. Not saying you shouldn't! Just what the "experts" claim. :-) O slept through the night from 4 months (the second night I put her in her own room). I had already started giving her less milk before that.
Liesje has a patter: 2 am and 5 am. During the day she goes from 2 hrs to 4 hrs between feedings. But I am gently trying to teach her the difference between day and night: In the evening I put her in her crib.

I can't wait for a good night's rest. I am doing okay, but some daaaazzzze. :-)

At the check-up today. She's five weeks, 5 kilos 300 and 57,5 cm. Hurrah!

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2076/2093597264_f76b5a83b9.jpg

Well, you know, I'm OK with giving a baby the breast for comfort as well as food :-)

But he has shown the past few nights that he's fine without it and can settle himself pretty easily now. I'm glad I waited til I was sure he was ready -- after all, it's such a short time in the scheme of things.