Pukiness and photos (not of the pukiness, hehe!)

Hmmm.

Arthur was sick again at bedtime tonight - weird. I am not sure what to make of it! Neil and I can't figure it out, and I phoned my mum but she can't think what's going on either. He's FINE otherwise. The only other time he has been sick at bedtime was 2 nights ago, so it can't be a bug (apart from the fact that we can track back seven days or more without any opportunity for him to have picked up a viral bug) as he's fine in between and the two incidents were 48 hours apart.

The only thing in common is the fact that it was exactly the same timing - after a bedtime breastfeed, while I was singing lullabies. He generally takes a lot of milk and does get too full. I don't know why he wouldn't self-regulate though, you know?

Again I did not panic - go me! :) Arthur did, however :( Poor boy. He really is scared of being sick. He fought it for ages and just sat there grey and panicky with hastily grabbed towels from the boys' bathtime in front of him on the bed. Nathan was crying and crying, and had been for a while as we were both busy dealing with Arthur, so I went out to settle him (leaving Arthur with Neil) and that's when he was sick.

Things making me nervous:

* Neil said it was projectile
* He didn't feel better afterwards. He stayed grey and panicky and said he still felt sick - for ages actually, best part of half an hour or so. We even expected him to be sick again so we stayed there at the ready, but eventually he settled down.

I'm not sure what to expect, since he still felt sick afterwards. That usually means he'll be sick again sometime, but WHY would he be? What could it be? Having said that, 3 hours have passed and he's still sleeping peacefully, like the last time this happened. He was fine and dandy last time, not a peep all night and then acting and eating normally from the moment he woke in the morning. But that time he was fine after he threw up.

I'm hoping Neil's opinion on the projectile factor is just him not knowing what REAL projectile vomiting is like!

The common factor is the breastmilk, which seems odd to me. I will say though, I do have ridiculously huge quantities of milk at the moment. But, enough to make a 3-year-old vomit after having fed his brothers with it too?!?! That sounds just... like I'm boasting, haha! Just crazy. There isn't a way to know how much Arthur is getting in that short bedtime breastfeed. The boys only nurse for about 3 minutes really, maybe 5 minutes at the absolute most. Some days just a couple of minutes maybe. As soon as they're latched on, I pray and then sing a song, and that's it, I make them stop. Arthur is by far the most efficient of my boys at getting the milk though. The side that Matthew had at bedtime is always fuller than the side Arthur had, and they were nursing for exactly the same amount of time.

Tonight, I nursed Nathan for a full side before I went up to put the boys to bed (Neil was bathing them while I breastfed Nathan). At bedtime, I offered Arthur the side that Nathan had nursed from, and Matthew had the other side. Neil told me he estimated that Arthur had had maybe HALF A PINT of breastmilk, after cleaning everything up after he threw up! That's crazy much after nursing the baby there first!

Although, now I'm wondering.... all the milk Arthur got would have been hindmilk, and plenty of it. Right now, my milk is geared towards Nathan's needs, and breastmilk for a 2-month-old is pretty near a peak for fat and calorie content. The fat content will gradually decrease as Nathan gets older. My milk will probably be VERY rich and creamy right now, especially the hindmilk. Soooo, maybe it's too rich for Arthur in that quantity - his body is certainly not used to it, and it's not geared for his needs.

Is that a crazy theory? My mum wondered it, and Neil said in hindsight that he had wondered about that too, but didn't want to mention it in case I took offense! ;) But I wonder why Matthew isn't affected? My mum said that maybe it's because he doesn't take as much from me in that one sitting. Also, he's younger. And his tummy has always been far stronger than Arthur's - Arthur has such a sensitive stomach and is so picky about strong flavours. He once threw up at the table when I forgot to put sugar in the topping for the apple crumble! He only put a bit of the crumble in his mouth, and reacted waaaay over-the-top and then threw up! So, maybe. It seems a bit far-fetched to me, but I can't think of another explanation. I truly hope it isn't something infectious, but I can't think how it could be.

Neil thinks I should cut down the amount of milk Arthur gets - that I should ration him, sort of. He nurses twice a day (including the bedtime feed) and EVERY day I have to turn him down several times, asking for milky. He has a fairly good-sized nursing session in the middle of the day when Matthew has gone for his nap. I nurse Matthew to sleep and then come downstairs and offer the same side that Matthew had, to Arthur. He will curl up with me and watch part of a Pixar movie or something, and breastfeed for a while - longer than bedtime. Once or twice he has said he had too much milky after he has finished a day time session, but not like he does at bedtime.

I feel reluctant to partially wean him as I always wanted him to self-wean and he definitely doesn't seem to be ready for that. I NEVER thought I would have wean (or part-wean) because I had too much/too rich milk for my 3-year-old! Craziness. I know my milk will get less like this (and less in volume hopefully) as the months go by, but I don't know how long it will be before it's okay for Arthur again.

If it even IS the breastmilk that's the problem. Aaargh! I just don't know what to make of it!

Anyway. Change of subject! Thank you Shelley and Siobhan for your comments last entry! :) I'm glad I am not as daft as I feel with the mushy nicknames! ;)

I have sooooo many photos to post that I'm really behind on, so here goes. Some of them are from last month even. I will just post as many as I can before Nathan wakes up to nurse (due any time really as he's been 3.5 hours since the start of his last feed now!).

I have to mention that the entire house is an absolute PIT at the moment, mess-wise - urgh! It's rather visible in some of the photos. *sigh* But oh well. Tis a season. I have plans! I have been so frustrated with this cold knocking me down harder than I expected and taking ages to clear up. It has meant that I haven't had energy to do anything with the mess for two weeks - I have just had to sit around looking at the state of it all and picking up the odd few things that cannot even be noticed by 30 minutes later! Tsk. But it will soon change! :)

Here are a couple of pictures of the boys in their new playpen (thank you Melanie! *hugs*), which is actually now rectangular shaped so that it doesn't take up so much room. It's GREAT for a time-out, a safe zone for Nathan in his bouncy chair for a few minutes, a way to seperate Arthur and Matthew if the need arises, and also to give them their own space for playing cars or something on their own. If Matthew won't stop leaping on Arthur to play rough-and-tumble when Arthur DOES NOT want to play, and something is about to boil over in the kitchen, it's also a good place to plonk poor Matthew for a few minutes (he does not like this!) to keep the situation in the living room from becoming worse than a boiled-over pot in the kitchen! They LOVE the playpen. It's a shame we really don't have the space for it. It has reduced the living room space to like a postage stamp (or so it seems!) and that's our only room to live in during the day. Which is crazy with two small energetic boys! We go out for long periods for them to run and play at the park, etc, but lately we've been stuck inside because we've been poorly so it has been difficult! We are hoping to get somebody to store our armchair soon, so that will make more space for the playpen and give a bigger room space again.

Anyway, these pics are from last month - we were getting things ready for them to go up to bed, and suddenly noticed they were sitting in the playpen and had pulled lots of books down from their bookshelf, and were reading soooo sweetly and quietly! :)

Here's Arthur making a sort of den out of the playpen, to play with his cars where Matthew can't interfere!

Here are a few pictures of my sweet little boys playing cars together - something they do many times EVERY day. They both are obsessed with playing with toy cars. They play on their own, individually, more often than not. But they also sometimes play together, or side-by-side with the cars. They really enjoy each others' company with this game - though Arthur can't stand it when Matthew messes up a carefully arranged line of cars! Matthew just loves driving them around the floor and arranging them (not so much into lines though). Arthur plays "supermarket car parks" and "traffic jam" and so on. They can play with cars for ages, and they're in their own little worlds while they do. I love watching them!

Arthur making a "car picture" with Neil. He asks to do this EVERY DAY! Seriously! It's something we do sometimes for school - school is pretty much mainly crafts and cooking and other fun things. He is learning about things as we do these things. I sometimes do a more focused activity based on a letter of the alphabet, say, and the other day we made a fun number chart with all sorts of different things to stick on it. We made a tractor picture a few days ago with a dried beans-and-lentils road! That was great fun :) It's on the wall at the moment. I must take some pictures of what we're doing from time to time. Anyway, Arthur's favourite thing is to use his own scissors to cut out pictures from his car magazines, and then glue them all onto a piece of paper. That boy knows all the different makes of car just by looking at them! I have no clue about this kind of thing! Neil has been teaching him ;)

Neil got his ancient keyboard down from the loft recently, for something to do with the boys. They LOVE the keyboard! Arthur especially loves putting the tacky demo music on and pretending he's playing it, hehe. Matthew, for some reason, keeps pushing the volume up and then he is terrified of the sound that suddenly deafens him and cries. But then when we turn it down and he recovers, he goes right back and puts the volume up again for another scare! Funny boy :)

Both the boys have been really tired at the end of their colds - we have been exhausted and feeling weak too, so it must be part of the virus. One lunchtime Matthew was eating his lunch in the highchair and he fell asleep whilst chewing! Bless! At least he'd had the mainstay of his lunch - they have Nutella sandwiches after their main ones and before yoghurt/fruit, and that's what he was eating when he dozed off! Neil said he was slumped with his eyes closed, food in hand, but with his mouth still juuuust about chewing, hehe! He took two photos :)

He went straight up to bed from the highchair, and didn't wake when his face was wiped or when he was carried up to bed! Sweet little chocolatey boy :)

I got money for my birthday from everyone who normally gives me something! They said to spend it on stuff I wanted to get, instead of putting it into the bottomless pit of nothingness that is our bank account right now. So I did, and I'm so excited about my birthday presents in a childlike way, really!

I bought:

* Pink stripey PJ bottoms from eBay! I love pyjamas!

* A pair of luxury Marks and Spencers pyjamas! :)

* Chris Tomlin's CD, "Arriving" - we sing a lot of those songs at church, and I just LOVE his music.

* A FLYLADY ORDER!!! I'm so excited! I have ordered her feather dusters, the ultimate timer, a rubber scrubba (!), and a water bottle, which will help me drink my water. I can't WAIT till it arrives!

* THREE new nursing bras! Again, soooooooo excited! They are all Elle Macpherson Maternelles, as those are the most comfortable bras I have ever worn, and they fit me well. They are a tad too tight when my milk is plentiful like from when it comes in after having a baby till maybe 4 months postpartum, or so. But they are GREAT! They are pretty expensive though. I have three lavender-coloured ones - one was bought new before Arthur was born, and the other second hand from eBay a few months later. I treated myself to another new one when I was pregnant with Nathan - it was much cheaper than usual though, as it was from eBay. One of the older ones has broken now, which Arthur has adopted as his "snuggly" (bless him!). I went to order one, and Googled to find the cheapest option. I found Zodee and they cannot be beaten for value, seriously! The bras come from Australia so I have to wait a bit to get them. But the deal was sooooo good for three bras that I couldn't resist. I am getting two pink and one green bra! I love a touch of colour to my underwear, haha! :)

* Also I bought five books from Amazon:
- "Raising Boys"
- "The Mom Walk" (under recommendation from Sarah)
- "The Mission of Motherhood" by the same author.
- "Christmas Jars because I have wanted to read it for some time. I read it the morning it arrived and it was a sweet, inspiring read. I am excited about reading! I love to read, but just haven't done so properly for AGES.
- "Let Me Be a Woman" by Elisabeth Elliot, an author also recommended to me by Sarah. I am desperate for books to inspire and uplift me as I do my "job" of mothering. I also NEED stuff that will point me to Jesus while I do it. I absolutely have to lean on God for everything. That is how I will absolutely definitely manage to cope with six children if we have them! Only in God's strength. So I need to start drawing on it as I keep having children!

I also bought a couple of bags of Cadbury's Mini Eggs from the supermarket :) And two pairs of FLUFFY pink socks from Tesco! I love them! I have a huuuuge weakness for socks (and pyjamas!). They were £1.50!!!! Here are my birthday feet :)

And they come in very handy for doing things like this!

I am so thrilled with allll my lovely birthday presents! I love to buy my own presents, hehe! I get exactly what I want, and I can get excited about things arriving once I've ordered them :)

And lastly, here is a photo of my sweet little Nathan - it's one I have already posted in my pregnancy diary, but I don't want to post a ton of photos here and NONE of them have Nathan in them! Plus, I love this photo! :)

I have a good many photos on the camera again, of all three of the boys (not all in one photo though, sadly!), so I will hopefully have more to post soon! Sorry there were sooooo many in one entry this time - hope it didn't take an age to load for anyone!

I absolutely must go now! Nathan has woken and nursed and gone back to sleep. I actually typed a little of this entry with my big toes while I nursed him, hahaha! The laptop was on the floor out of reach and I was sooooo longing to continue this entry, so out of sheer desperation (!) I used my toes to type, hehe! They ache now. Nathan went over 4 hours from his last feed, sleeping almost 3 hours in one block!!!!! He is still sleeping right next to me on the sofa, on a little made up "bed" of flannelette sheets, while I sit here and type this. His feet are touching my leg. I love him so!

I need to finish a Tesco online order (hopefully be delivered tomorrow, though it's a bit late now!) as we're pretty much out of food and a few other things. Then I will scoop up my tiny and go to bed :)

I am SO-oh-oh blessed. Did I mention that recently? Well, I am. God is so good to me. I have three sons! My heart aches and my brain boggles at the realisation! God is sooo good to me.

The Big 4-0!! Jove's party pics, and other stuff

I have just realised that Arthur is now 40 months old! How have FORTY months gone by since I became a mummy? Although, it feels sometimes like forty YEARS since I became a mummy, and I'm amazed that I have had three children in that space of time! I can't remember/fathom what life was like before I had children, it's really weird.

Anyway. Arthur is a third of the way through being 3, this month. How crazy! I'm sure he just had a birthday or something.... Matthew is now 21 months old - just three months before his 2nd birthday is here! Yikes! My big boys :)

We've all been ill since my last diary entry here. I meant to come back almost immediately to post pictures from Jove's party, but haven't had chance really. I'll post them this entry though! Arthur got a nasty cold the day after my last entry, and then Matthew got it. Nathan and I succumbed too, shortly after that. Neil has eventually got it, but a reeeally mild version. He has hardly had any symptoms of a cold as such, but he's had the aching and the exhaustion. It's been a really weird cold. It has FELT a lot like flu for the aches and complete exhaustion and weakness, but has otherwise behaved like a cold (no fever, for example). I am sooooo eager for the end of the germy season!

It has affected each of us differently, but I know it's the same bug. I had a horrible throat for almost a week and lost a few nights' sleep with it, yeurgh. I also got laryngitis - I HATE that! I am a real talker and cannot stand losing my voice! I couldn't sing to my boys or talk much at all. I couldn't be understood on the phone. Ugh, I am so glad to have my voice back now, albeit husky and loooowwww, hehe! Matthew has had his worst bug/cold with this one. He has seemed to have a strong immune system so far, catching everything more mildly than the rest of us, but this time he has been as poorly as anyone else.

Nathan is totally congested and can't breathe to sleep or feed, ugh. His is taking AGES to clear up. He has been congested just as badly for nearly a week straight now. Every night I think (sleepily!) that SURELY tomorrow night he'll at least be a little less congested, but noooo. He and I are not getting much sleep. Thank you God for blessing me with my sweet husband home all the time right now, because this is how I am surviving! I get to catch up on sleep through the morning whenever Nathan lets me. Most mornings it isn't much at all (given that he's still as congested as during the night), but this morning and yesterday morning I had a couple of hours sleep which made a huuuuge difference. He sleeps with me in my bed right now.

So then after a week of the cold (having been nowhere out of the house due to being all poorly), Arthur started having diarrhoea. He had awful diarrhoea for 48 hours straight. He was eating normally and full of his usual energy till the second day and then he had slightly less appetite and flagged more easily. The second night, he was awake a LOT, crying with abdominal cramps. So I took him to the doctor. She said it could be the end of this particular cold-y bug for him, and maybe just the way HE would deal with it - not necessarily how the virus would hit everyone. She said that the diarrhoea that she was seeing at the moment was lasting typically 48-72 hours before clearing up. He only had one more bout after seeing the doctor and that was it. But 2 days later, Matthew started having diarrhoea, and continued for about 36 hours. He also seemed otherwise fine (full of cold, eating normally, energetic, etc), but it was a pain!

I am anxious about Nathan because a 9 week old baby does NOT need to get 48-hours-worth of severe diarrhoea! It would be baaad news. I'm worried it's part of the cold bug, because he definitely has that. Plus, *I* don't personally want to add the runs for 2 days to the things my body is dealing with right now! I am struggling to stay hydrated enough with having a cold myself and breastfeeding 3 little boys - one of whom is a new baby who is having YET ANOTHER growth spurt (seriously, this boy will be off the chart soon if he doesn't slow down!), and increased breastfeeding for the other two due to the diarrhoea, etc.

I AM washing with soap after the older boys nurse, every time. I am also FED UP with doing that! I am getting sore. But oh well. I have Lansinoh cream if I need it, and it will only be for a while. And hopefully worth it, if it DOES happen to have been a separate bug that I might have managed to prevent spreading to Nathan. I don't know where they could have caught a separate bug though.

Anyway. Tonight at bedtime, Arthur was sick! But we THINK it was the chicken sausages we had for dinner. He hasn't been ANYWHERE for like a week, except to Tesco the day before yesterday (but it was a brief trip and he was in the pushchair the whole time), and to the park today (where, according to Neil, he just ran and ran, and didn't have contact with anybody or anything). That's it! We hadn't had chicken sausages before, and these ones were really rich and heavily spiced. They were okay, but I wouldn't personally buy them again. Anyway, Arthur only ate sausages (not THAT many though), and a few baked beans. He didn't have anything bland to go with it. He is still soooo picky at meal times. *sigh* He had banana for dessert.

I have a TON of milk these days and every boy gets very full when they breastfeed. I do find that AMAZING. That my breasts can do that! I think the supply and demand thing is just boggling. At bedtime, we put Matthew and Arthur to bed together now. They have a bath (every other night), and then get into night nappies and pyjamas (having to retire the sleepsuits for Matthew - he has a thing about undressing himself when he wears them, sadly!) in their bedroom. We then read a couple of stories on somebody's bed (they choose whose bed each night), and then we turn out the lights and I sit on somebody's bed (not necessarily the same one we had Story Time on) with a boy on each side of me, and let them breastfeed. I LOVE this part of their bedtime routine and it's the one nursing session I'm most protective of. BUT, I don't physically enjoy it very much. Having two older toddlers breastfeeding at once can be a really overwhelming sensation and not too pleasant! It's sometimes just too much and it makes me want to pull my own skin off. Also sometimes it's sore to nurse them. But I don't want to change it. I have found that bedtime "milky" is the perfect time to put my arms around my boys and pray out loud for them and sing to them. It distracts me, and blesses them, and it's part of their bedtime routine that I want in there anyway, even if I wasn't breastfeeding them. On the occasions where I find it too uncomfortable, I sing a SHORT song, hehe! As soon as I have prayed and sung to them, that's the end of Milky Time.

When I pray with them I always thank God for our day and pick out specific things to say thank you for. I always pray for each of the boys with any specific needs they have, and I pray for their sleep, and for good dreams, etc. I pray for healing if they need healing. The songs I sing are always worship songs. I sometimes even find that while I'm singing worship songs in the dark with an arm round each of them as they breastfeed, my heart unexpectedly soars and I can actually have a little time of closeness with God for myself. Not always though!

Then the boys have to get in their beds and I sing lullabies. I always sing the same three in the same order, I don't know how that started, but it's nice anyway! I sing "Golden Slumbers" because my mummy sang it to me when I was little, and her mummy sang it to her. Then I sing all three verses of "Away in a Manger" because it's sleepy and the boys like it. And then I sing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" three times, more slowly than it's usually sung, and I improvise so each "verse" sounds different - I make it more and more lilting and sleepy as I go along (doesn't always have the desired effect though, hehe!).

Arthur now stays in bed and is often asleep by the time I'm finished singing. Matthew is currently being "trained" to stay in bed. *sigh* It's working though. Before that, he was getting out and running round emptying clothing out of drawers, jumping on Neil's bed, making a TON of noise and disturbing (or even worse, exciting) Arthur, laying on his bed kicking the wall, etc. Now he gets disciplined for kicking the wall, and for getting off his bed after they get in bed from having milky. And it's a LOT better already. He got off the bed twice tonight, that's all! And kicked the wall "just" 3 times! I am right there to discipline him when he does, so it's swiftly dealt with. We pretty much wait with the boys till they're both asleep right now, but I'm planning to "wean" Matthew off that gradually. Right now he gets upset if we leave while he's falling asleep, and cries at the gate (we put the portable safety gate from the kitchen doorway in their bedroom doorway at night) for us.

Anyway. They both - Arthur in particular - finish that brief Milky Time at bedtime very full of milk. Arthur often groans and says he's had too much milky! I have often wondered if he is actually queasy from it, as he seems to act that way and sometimes continues to groan and complain of having had too much milky for a while after they're in bed. I suppose it's kind of like I would feel if I drank a full glass of water as fast as I could (my flow is very fast and they all have trouble keeping up when my milk lets down).

Tonight was like that, and he stayed quiet while I sang the lullabies, just tossing and turning a bit. And after that he threw up! I did know he was going to, though, because he was acting scared and whimpery and he wouldn't tell me why. Then he started crying, "Noooo" and something went TING in my head - he's just like me, scared of being sick, and wanting to fight it rather than have to DO it. I knew that's what he was doing. Sadly I only had a small terry towel to hand so all his bedding and pyjamas needed changing, but the thing I am MOST proud of is how I handled it! I did not freak out or panic!!!! Yay me! I was aware that I was shaking a little bit while he was actually throwing up, but it was at the same time as I was rubbing his back and saying soothing things to him - I really and truly did not freak out, I'm so amazed!

I FELT way outside my comfort zone, though. I am just so proud of how I kept calm. I think it was actually more to do with the fact that Arthur was in more distress than I was, and I cared waaaaaay more about how he was feeling than about how I was feeling. I wonder if he had breezed through the ordeal, I might have had the opportunity to panic more? Anyway. I just called downstairs to Neil who was walking Nathan back and forth to settle him to sleep. It's funny, I knew I was somewhat panicky by the fact that I was saying such ULTRA calm things, almost ridiculous in the way I worded them without thinking about it (does that even make sense?!) - "Neil, can you come upstairs without hesitating please?!" hehehe! That was my instinctive calm version of "NEIL!!!! Get up here NOW!!" ;) He brought Nathan with him, and I calmly told him to "take him out of the room immediately", hehe!

Anyway. Poor Arthur! He does get so scared. He is so like me. He does have a sensitive palate and tummy, it seems, and Neil was instantly convinced that Arthur was sick because the sausages had just been too rich for him. That sounds a bit flimsy to me - d'you think? But I guess it's plausible. Arthur definitely returned the sausages, and felt waaaaaaaay better after being sick. Neil told him not to worry, that he didn't think he was poorly, just that the sausages had perhaps been a bit too rich for his tummy, that's all. After we stripped him down, Arthur sat next to me and Matthew on Neil's floor mattress, while Neil changed Arthur's sheets. He did a big sigh and said to me, "Mummy, I don't want to have those chicken sausages ever again!" and rolled his eyes with a sort of tired exasperation, hehe! He told me, "I really don't like being sick...." and I told him that I really really don't like being sick either, so I understood exactly how he felt. We talked about it for a bit. It's so nice that he is now old enough to really communicate absolutely ANYTHING when he's ill in any way.

He went to sleep fine after that, and Matthew did too. It's after midnight now and they haven't made a peep since. I was perfectly happy with the thought that it really was just the sausages at the time (maybe that's another reason why I didn't panic like I usually would? No risk to ME if it's not an infectious thing?), but you know me - I have since started questioning whether it's likely to REALLY be just the sausages, and wondering if he might have picked up something he could share with the rest of us. But I don't think he has been in contact with anyone, or even anything. And he hasn't been sick again. His diarrhoea finished days ago, so he's all clear from that, and his cold is gone too. He's the healthiest one amongst us now! The rest of us were at least a couple of days behind him on the cold-y thing. He did get very full on my milk, so maybe it was a combination of rich dinner and tooooo full with the bedtime milky? I always tell him to stop before he gets TOO full of milk, but he never does. He likes the length of time that he's used to, with nursing. I now have more milk than before, so in that same length of time, he is getting a lot more milk, and quickly too.

Anyway, I'm waffling! But I hope Arthur really IS alright and that I have nothing to worry about.

Okay, I must post the photos from Jove's party, if nothing else! Everything gets so out of date before I get around to posting it here! I wrote about the party last entry. The photos we got were mainly of our boys climbing on the soft play stuff and in the ball pool. Arthur went on the older kids' stuff with Neil, and Matthew stayed in the toddlers' area with me (nice friends of Jemma's held Nathan!), but after a while Matthew was much more keen on following Arthur on the older kids' stuff. He was way too little for most of it though! He watched for a long time, and at the end Neil took him round some of the slides and things. Arthur just climbed around like a monkey and had a wonderful time! Matthew liked the ride-on cars soooo much. Arthur came into the toddler area after a while and enjoyed those cars as well. I wish we had a suitable outdoor space for them to use a car like that. I always intended to get them one. In the 3rd photo here, Matthew is at the bottom of the climbing thingy (barely visible actually!), and you can see him in the 4th photo in the background while Arthur is in the car. The last one of this little set shows Matthew watching Arthur on the big kids' equipment! He loves to do whatever Arthur does, and he is definitely every bit as hardy and adventurous, even more so perhaps!

Then there was party food! I think it's the first party for both the boys where they've had a sit-down children's party meal. Arthur had one at Josh's 3rd birthday party, but Matthew has never had one - how exciting! I was holding Nathan and Neil was watching the boys during the food time so I didn't really find out how they took to it. Arthur picked at his plate and only ate the odd thing from it. Matthew ate his pretty well. They sat opposite each other at the far end of the table. They looked soooooooo sweet sat at the table with all the little ones there! I mean, ALL the little ones looked sweet! ;) I'm so "myownkids" focused, hehe!

After a bit more running around (and pooey nappy changes for all three of our boys! What fun!) it was time to do sing Happy Birthday and for Jove to blow out his birthday candles. He had a FABULOUS cake! Now that Jemma has posted her photos, I can marvel at the detail of it here! ;) I loved the "rubble" - I am soooo going to use that idea on Matthew's birthday cake when he turns two. He is heavily into tractors, like I mentioned last entry (THANK YOU Vikki for the Tractorland link!), and I'm thinking of a similar cake theme, based on a tractor instead of Bob the Builder - though he LOVES Bob the Builder too, and was delighted with Jove's cake! If anyone has seen Jemma's montage of the party on her (locked) diary, I was amused to see the video part of the birthday cake, as Arthur was hopping around in the background, beside himself with excitement during the whole thing, bless him! He loooooves cake, particularly chocolate cake, and had his eye on it for the entire mealtime! ;)

Anyway, I got a couple of photos of Jemma's lovely family as we sang Happy Birthday to Jove!

Jemma sent me a photo of Matthew that one of her friends took at the party, so I'll post that here too - this was taken after he spilled a whole drink down his front and had to be changed into.... a non-existant outfit! Because we had neglected to bring anything in his size. We had brought Arthur a change of T-shirt (in case he got too hot running about, as he is apt to do), but nothing else at all! Poor Matthew had to wear an "age 4" T-shirt and a pair of age 2-3 Thomas the Tank underpants over his nappy to stop him taking it off without his jeans on!

So we had a lovely time! Thank you Jemma! It was lovely to see Jaya and Jove too, as it had been a year since I saw them last. I feel like I know them so well just through Jemma's diary, I suppose in the same way that she knows my boys through mine! They seemed completely familiar to me the whole time.

Well I have had to stop this twice to breastfeed Nathan, and now it's ridiculously late (2am!) and I should take Nathan up to bed. While he's this congested, he isn't sleeping at ALL when we put him down (he wakes instantly, unable to breathe), so I am just putting him next to me wherever I am, once he's asleep, and he is sleeping better that way. I'm able to attend to him the moment he stirs or fusses, and that means he is more likely to stay asleep. The poor little chap. I am just trying to help him get a solid block of sleep the best I can. During the evening he sleeps on the sofa next to where I'm sitting. I make a bed for him with sheets and lay him there. He's sleeping again now, so I should finish this, get ready for bed, and scoop that sweet baby boy up and take us to bed.

I have a bunch of photos to post of the boys. I really want to get to that soon. I never seem to get back to finish what I meant to finish, as quickly as I hope to! Just in case that happens again, a few things I meant to record here for prosperity:

* Matthew's jumping. Did I already write about it though? He is jumping ever so early for his age. He has been jumping HIGH with both feet, very steadily, since about 18 months old. I know it's a 2-year-old milestone, and Arthur started jumping pretty much around the age of 2, maybe the month before or something. Matthew practises jumping OFF things with two feet, and lands ever so securely from jumping HIGH into the air from the sofa or from an upturned toy box! He is just unstoppable, that boy! He can also do continuous jumps with both feet, across the room, without faltering. He jumps quite a long way with each jump!

* Matthew's speech is coming on. He has a lot of words now, though many of them are pronounced toddlerishly (word?!). He says a FEW two-word phrases, which I think he was starting to do the last time I wrote about it - like saying "Bye Arthur" or something (he still pronounces that, "bah, Ah-yah"). Nathan is pronounced, "Ninny"!! It's so cute :) All day long we hear, "Ninny! Ninny!" He ADORES Nathan, I mean, ADORES him. Seriously. He cries if he doesn't get to see "Ninny" before his nap, when he gets up from his nap, before bed, etc. He just looooves "Ninny". He likes to kiss his face, hands, etc, evvverso gently. He has learned to kiss properly, starting with his lips slightly pursed together, and then making a little "puh" sound when he places the kiss. He has practised soooo hard timing the "puh" sound at the same time as making contact with Nathan's face/my arm, etc. He's SO adorable. I want to just scrunch right up inside with how in love I am with that boy!

* Slightly embarrassing nicknames. *sigh* You all know I had some humdingers for Matthew when he was a baby. I think I listed them once or twice, and thankfully nobody left me awful comments, hehe! I just can't seem to help myself - I have a THING for silly affectionate nicknames for my babies, and they just pop out of my mouth and mutate over the weeks and months, and I. can't. stop. myself! Somebody help me. I remember Matthew was "binksie boy", "twiglet", "lambie-loo", and many others! I think it is getting worse with each child. *sigh* I am actually reluctant to write here the nicknames that have sprung forth for Nathan, because I'm kind of embarrassed!!! But I want to be able to record them so that I don't forget. I want to read them back one day when I've forgotten exactly what I used to call him, and when I remember them I'll get a warm fuzzy glow - it will be worth the humiliation for that golden moment, haha!

So, my current affectionate nicknames for Nathan (so far, I know there'll be more!) are (crinnnnnge....): "Nathie-noo-kneecaps" (I know), "Mummy's Little Loo Foo", "Lil Baffly Lamb" (I don't understand that one either! It just rolls off the tongue and makes my insides mushy when I say it to him. *sigh*), and a multitude of one-word names, many of which are food related - he is my "waffle", "muffin" (also even "muffin-woo"), and "lamb-puff" (don't ask!). He shares some nicknames with Matthew, like things starting with "mini" (mini lamb-puff, for example), and whereas Matthew is my "mini squinky boy", Nathan is my "tiny squinky boy". The lamb-puff one came from goodness knows where - it just fell out of my mouth one day during a particularly mushy moment, and I honestly nearly ovulate all my eggs at once when I press my cheek against his tiny squidgy one and whisper "sweet little lamb puff". I am obviously certifiable, but hey, at least it's the GOOD kind of crazy, right?! ;)

Mothers Day, and Jove's party (pics next entry)!

Why oh WHY does this crack me up so very much?!...

Hehehe! It's only 5 seconds long but it just tickled me for some reason. I admit, I replayed it quite a few times! ;)

In other news! Matthew is doing well in his toddler bed. The first night he fell out a LOT, but mostly stayed asleep. Neil found him in a different part of the room every time he woke up to check him, hehe! When Neil went up to bed, he found Matthew fast asleep on Neil's bed. He put him back in his own bed. When Neil woke next, Matthew wasn't in his bed, but after a quick search in the dark, he found him on his tummy on the carpet in front of Arthur's bed! Funny boy! Completely unconscious every time. I was up breastfeeding at 3.30am (Neil was completely asleep and unaware of this one), and heard a thud, followed by a sleepy, "Ohhh no!" which is what Matthew says when there is any sort of mishap or bump, hehehe!

He still falls out, though not so much I think. He never wakes! Last night I checked on him late in the evening and his bed was just empty! It was so dark that I couldn't see him in the room so I had to go in and fumble about! I found him on the soft padding of duvets and pillows on the floor. He had tumbled off the bed wrapped in his little duvet cover, so only his face was visible in the pile of soft bedding! He looked like a cute little mouse all fast asleep in there. He didn't wake when I put him back in his bed.

Matthew is such a sweetie! I love him so much! He is teething at the moment. He has been for a few MONTHS without a break actually - he's working on his canines (no sign yet). All his first molars are right through, so we're waiting on those canines before the fun fun 2-year-old molars to complete his set! Arthur had canines by now so I'm wondering where Matthew's are at. Judging by his symptoms I keep thinking, "Any SECOND now, surely!" but nope. Today he has red rough cheeks and a raw looking chin, which is a first, so maybe they're actually coming? He has been having Calpol most days for weeks and weeks, which - is that okay? He has been in pain with his teeth for a long while. He has been drooling aplenty all along, but never the sore skin till now. Poor boy! I hope they hurry up.

Yesterday we went to Jove's 2nd birthday party!!! It was so much fun! Jove's Mummy is Jemma, who has a locked diary, but some of the people who read my diary will know her! I haven't seen Jemma since Jove's 1st birthday, so it was lovely to meet up with them again. Jove's party was at a soft play centre, and the boys had a blast, having never been to one before. I think we'll have to go back there again sometime! Jove had a fab birthday cake, and the design (which I won't spoil since Jemma hasn't posted pics yet - although she HAS already said that it was a Bob the Builder cake!) was so good, and ideal for Matthew as he's a HUGE Bob the Builder fan too! I said to Jemma that I might have to nick part of the design idea for Matthew's birthday cake! I am already thinking about it, though there's not much point since it's not till the summer! He is heavily into tractors at the moment - they are definitely his favourite vehicle right now, though he loves ALL vehicles and pretty much focuses on them all day long. I think I might either do Bob the Builder (if he's still so into it) or a tractor design of some sort (incorporating part of Jemma's design - I loved the "rubble"!).

We did take pics at Jove's party but I haven't had chance to upload them, and anyway I think I will let Jemma post about it first! The boys ALL (three of them!) did poos at the soft play centre though. That was a lot of stinky nappy-changing! Nathan did two, actually - I had to change his second one on the car seat when we got back to the car after the party finished! And Matthew had a whole cup of orange juice spilled down his front at the birthday lunch. Every item of clothing he was wearing got soaked, including his socks! Of COURSE we had not brought a thing in his size with us. We had an "age 4" T-shirt in case Arthur got too hot racing around in his long-sleeved top (he gets hot, that boy!), so that went on Matthew like a beach T-shirt! He will undo any nappy he is wearing, so thankfully I found a pair of Thomas the Tank big boy underwear (age 3!) in my bag! And we put that on him over his nappy. He had to keep his socks on because you have to wear socks at all times there. But that's all the poor boy had to wear! He didn't seem to mind, and he ran about enough so that he didn't get too cold.

On the way back to the car we wrapped him up in the fleece Coorie sling that I brought in case I wanted to wear Nathan in it (he slept in the back of the tandem pushchair for the first time! Also in lots of broody mothers' arms, hehe!), to carry him there quickly. It was really cold and windy yesterday, brrr! On the way home, we stopped at Tesco and I ran inside to buy him some super cheap trousers to keep his legs warm. When I got inside I discovered it wasn't the type of Tescos that sells clothing! Poo. But they DID sell underwear and baby basics. I bought a 4-pack of TIGHTS, haha! My first purchase of girly toddler clothing, hehehe! I put him in the NAVY pair, rather than the pink or purple! ;) I am definitely a BOY mummy, and had no clue how to get the things on him (despite having worn tights myself in the past!). Once on though, I marvelled at them. They are soft, fit him perfectly, keep him warm, and he couldn't take them off :)

Neil rolled his eyes when I got in the car clutching tights for an 18-24 month old! I told him they'd probably come in handy one day :) I will hang on to those pink and purple pairs. The cream and navy pairs I think I may well use again on Matthew, if it stays chilly and windy like this, hehe!

Matthew is talking more! He is saying lots of new words, and we are starting to notice new ones every other day really. Not MILLIONS of them yet, and many of them are hard to recognise, but there's definitely a big increase. Today Arthur did a wee on the potty at bedtime (he wees and poos on the potty at bedtime pretty much every day! But we haven't taken him out of nappies as yet), and for a wee, he gets a Smartie. For a poo, it's 3 Smarties. Anyway, he asked for his Smartie, but because he had already brushed his teeth, we told him he would have it in the morning (this is something that happens a lot!), which he was fine with. Matthew appeared by my side a moment later, with his best adorable pleading expression on, asking, "Mar-mee?" I didn't know what he was saying, and the more wrong guesses I made, the more frustrated he got, and he started to cry :( Eventually I wondered if he had overheard the mention of a Smartie, and asked him, "Ohh, do you mean a Smartie?!" He took a HUGE breath of relief and said, "Yeah!" hehehe! He didn't get one though.

He says "cream" very clearly, with a 'w' instead of the 'r', which I always love! Little ones' pronounciations are so cute! He loves cream though - by that I mean nappy cream. He would loooove to get his little hands on a tub of the stuff, but so far we have managed to keep it away from him! I know it's just a matter of time though, somehow! Arthur smeared it all over his face when he was 22 months old, when I was putting Matthew down for a nap upstairs! Jemma wrote a recent entry about Jove's recent monkeyness, and it reminded me with a scary jolt that Matthew is approaching an age where the REAL monkey behaviour is about to start! I'm pretty anxious about it because he is already SUCH a monkey! Much more so than Arthur ever was. I'm dreading the water-on-the-HiFi, rice-on-the-floor, bread-with-every-slice-bitten-once, crayon-on-walls stage again! Yeurgh!

Okay that is all for now. I hear Nathan stirring - he has been fussing all evening and not staying asleep for some reason. Oh! I meant to write in my pregnancy diary about having taken him to the chiropractor 2 days ago! I will try to get an update there soon.

Oh I almost forgot - it was Mother's Day here on Sunday! I got a bunch of daffodils at church (I love that tradition!), which all the ladies got, whether they were mothers or not. Arthur was finally old enough to be one of the little ones handing them out! He was so sweet marching round purposefully holding his bunch of daffodils like an Olympic torch, looking for a lady without flowers to give them to! I felt so proud watching him.

My parents were here visiting for 3 days over the weekend! Yay! We saw them briefly on Thursday when they arrived, and then for a couple of hours on Friday, Saturday and Sunday! My mum brought ME a gift-wrapped box of Thorntons chocolates on Sunday, and handed them to me saying, "Happy Mothers Day!" So sweet of her! She has never let us do Mothers Day because she didn't want us sucked into the commercialism of it. So it felt really odd to have her give ME something like that on Mothers Day! I was totally not expecting it. I told her that she was MY mother, but she said, "You're the main mummy now" :) It made up for the argument Neil and I had as we got up with the boys early that morning, about me not allowing him to get the sleep he needs (say WHAT?!) and thus he was tired and cranky with the boys. I intervened and he snapped at me about it. *sigh* Thankfully he was big enough to tell me he was wrong and was sorry for it afterwards! He will hold Nathan during the evening if he is fussy, so that I can use both my hands to type. He watches the things he likes to see on TV (CSI and so on) while Nathan is on his front. So apparently this is my fault, that he's up late! Many are the times I have suggested he put the unconscious boy in his cot and go to bed, but he says things like, "Oh I'm not tired now." or, "I just want to watch the end of this." or, "Nah, there's a movie starting in 5 minutes that I've been wanting to see."

Anyway, it was all good in the end, but it wasn't the best start to Mothers Day! He never remembers the day anyway, but he did sheepishly wish me a Happy Mothers Day at church when he realised! ;) I spent the day happy to be a mummy to three precious little boys! How blessed am I?!! Yay! And my own mummy being here on that day AND surprising me with a gift was soooo special. So I had a happy day!

Okay, must go. Will update again soon!

A milestone for Matthew!

Thank you so much for all the lovely birthday wishes! :) I had a really nice day! We went out for that walk in the park, and I sat in a nice coffee room with some other mums from church and breastfed Nathan, while Neil and the other boys ran around outside in the park! We weren't there long, but it was so nice. In the afternoon I took a nap with Nathan! And when I woke up, Neil and Arthur had baked me a birthday cake with smarties on it (I wonder who thought of that part?!), AND our/their first ever attempt at chocolate brownies. Those were gooooood. Neil made a roast dinner, and I blew candles out on the cake after dinner, while Neil and Arthur sang "Happy birthday dear Muuuuh-meeeee!..." and Matthew "ahh ahh"ed along with their singing in his highchair! I don't think I had any presents to open at ALL on my birthday, and only 3 cards in the post, but I couldn't have been happier with my day!

Well, yet again it is LATE and I have a gazillion things on my mind to write about. BUT, I will just have to squash some of it down for another time, because really I want to make sure I write about a significant event from today!

Matthew and Arthur (and Neil) are currently sharing a bedroom - I mean, that's the plan, that they share, because we only have two bedrooms. Neil will move out when they're settled in and enough time has passed since Nathan arrived for it not to be toooo much of an upheaval for them. Matthew is in his cotbed, and Arthur is in the single bed (raised off the floor for the first time in his life!) with his bed guard in place. Neil is on a single mattress on the floor. It's SNUG (the room is only 12ft by 7ft!) but they all fit in there and it's going well.

Matthew has been chewing the heck out of his cot for ages now. I hear his teeth grinding on it at bedtime when the lights are out! He stands at the far end near the bedroom door, and just chews. He has gradually gnawed some big chunks out of that cot. We have teething rails on the sides of the cot, but he hasn't bothered with those bits! He goes for the nice arched ends, and he has scraped the varnish off with his teeth and everything. It looks yucky, and I'm sure it's not good for him either!

Then the night before last, Neil and I were putting the boys to bed. Matthew was in his cot and Arthur on his bed, and we were just getting the bedtime story ready. Matthew is OBSESSED with "Little Red Train to the Rescue" at the moment. Thankfully it's a lovely story, since I have to read it constantly these days! I have lately restricted it to bedtime, and he begs for it at naptime too! He calls it, "Leh Cwane". His speech hasn't improved much since my last entry (only a week ago, I know!), and that would be impossible to understand for anyone who didn't know him and who was familiar with what he was asking for. "Leh" is a combination of the "L" in "Little" and the "eh" for "red"! And "Cwane" is train, obviously! ;)

So I was holding it but it was out of his reach where he was in his cot. He has got sooooo tall lately. He's definitely taller than Arthur ever was at this age. He's still so little against Arthur, but he has made quite a jump in height lately (Arthur has too - we just noticed that today actually!), and for the first time he's starting to look like he's catching Arthur up in height just a little bit. He'll be taller than Arthur eventually, I'm sure. He just has a longer/leaner body type than Arthur.

I haven't posted photos of Matthew in ages, it seems. Here is one of him a few weeks ago (just before he had a LOT of hair cut off! He was so distressed at the hairdressers, and he always is, that Neil asked them to take plenty off so he wouldn't have to come back so soon! His hair grows soooo fast) - just doing what he does these days. He is into everything, curious about all things, and constantly on the go:

King Matthew, hehe!

He LOVES dressing up in Arthur's dressing up clothes, more than Arthur does in fact! And here's a photo taken just about a week ago, if not less than that (after the haircut, as you can see!). Here's something I forgot to write here when I noticed it a few months ago - Matthew's blue eyes have done exactly what my blue eyes did as a toddler (and what my mum wondered if they'd do because of my eyes) - they have "greyed up"! They are still a lovely clear colour, no rings and just one brown spot above the right pupil there. But they are absolutely clear grey, no blue whatsoever. They just WENT like it over a month or so, recently. Anyway - photo!

Anyway, I digress! Where was I? Oh yes! He leeeaned out over the cot side (which was right up), and just flipped out onto the floor! He was pretty shocked, but so were we! So, there we have it. He isn't climbing out at all. But he's tall enough to fall out by accident (he did it again last night, reaching again), and he's eating his way through the poor cot anyway! So we nervously (!) decided that it is time that we turn his cot into a toddler bed.

My parents came over from France this morning for a long weekend type of visit, to see my grandparents and Thea and our boys all in just a few days. So we'll see them a bit for a few days but only for short visits. We all miss them so I'm happy for ANY length of visit! They were here for an hour this afternoon and while the boys were occupied with Nana and Grandy, Neil went in the loft and got the toddler bed ends down, and turned the cot into a toddler bed! I went up to see it when he was finished and I felt kind of tearful when I walked in the room and saw it, I have to say. There it was - a teeny tiny little "big boy" bed - no rails or guards to confine him any longer! The old chewed cot ends were still in the room standing against Arthur's bed, and suddenly I realised my baby boy was growing up! Waaah! It doesn't matter that I have another baby boy, I still feel sad about THIS baby boy growing up before my eyes! But, since he was born I have really not like him being behind those bars where I can't reach down to kiss him (once the base was low enough) while he sleeps. Sometimes it has driven me crazy, like an itch I can't scratch! So I'm THRILLED to be able to kiss his little face while he sleeps now! :)

Anyway. I took a photo after I had my wistful moment! ;)

After Nana and Grandy left, we took the boys up to explain the changes and let them explore the new bed a little. Here they are on Matthew's new bed!

They were BESIDE themselves with excitement about it at bedtime, especially Arthur, for some reason! He wanted to sleep in there with Matthew all night, but we said there wasn't room for them both to SLEEP. He was disappointed, but we said they could lie together in there for the bedtime story! Here they are at story time (guess which story, hehe!):

Please please disregard what you see of my hair in the last photo. *sigh* It needs a wash, and my "Matthew hair" that came in 4 months after he was born is now just annoyingly too short to tuck behind my ears, but too long to have flapping all over my face - hence the very attractive job I've made of pinning those bits out of the way! *sigh*

It took the boys AGES to go to sleep. Matthew would not stay in bed. We moved the portable safety gate from the kitchen doorway to their bedroom door for the night, and Neil stayed in there with them till they slept. We padded the floor next to Matthew's bed with a big duvet cover, in case he rolled out. He is usually ALL OVER his cot and banging into the sides in his sleep, so we expected he might. At 11pm we heard a huge thump and ran upstairs to find Matthew totally unconscious on the duvet on the floor! I can't believe he slept through falling out of bed! It IS only a very low bed though, not far to fall. We put him back, and I took a photo with the flash, of the boys fast asleep :)

Aren't you amazed that I have taken, uploaded, and posted in a diary entry, a photo that was only taken like an hour ago?!! I am, hehe! I'm usually so behind with photos! But I really wanted to write about this (with photos!) as it happened, and I spent my whole evening doing the uploading. I can't seem to resize photos properly with the new camera software, so that's why they're too big for this diary page. Oh well. They'll have to do.

Anyway! I have so much more to write about but Nathan is waking and I have to get him and nurse his sweet little self! Will try to update more soon, and I also have a ton to write (and lots of photos waiting now, yay!) at my pregnancy diary! Back soon!

Difficult boys, but happy mama! :)

It's 2.30am! I'm nuts, writing a diary entry at 2.30am when I should be sleeping. But Nathan is about to wake for a feed (it has been about 2 hours since his last one and it's unusual for him to go much longer than that at the moment), so I might as well start a diary entry while I'm here! Not much to type though, unfortunately, because I am sure to have very few fingers available to type with in a matter of minutes! I reeeeeeeally want/NEED to write about a ton of stuff that is going through my mind. But I don't think tonight is the right time, because it's late, and I won't be able to type much. It will drive me crazy to start on it and then not be able to write much after just a couple of minutes!

I wanted to write about (in BRIEF!!):

* Matthew's talking, or lack thereof. I think he's about to take off in that department, but hmmm, Babycentre told me that my 20-month-old (he's 20 months!!! Can you believe it?!) now has a vocabulary of about 200 words (um, no), and between the age of 18 and 20 months has been learning 10 words a day! I want to write in more detail about which words Matthew DOES say and how he pronounces stuff and all the usual kind of thing that I write here like that! But no time. Nathan is in the Moses basket near me and he's stirring already (and thus farting, haha!), so I know he'll be up and ready to nurse in a minute. I haven't even got a vague idea of how MANY words Matthew says, just that it's not many. Most of the ones he does say are only understandable to us, but that's okay. He'll catch up. Arthur said only a handful of words I think, and then SUDDENLY had a word explosion and was talking in sentences a couple of months later (if memory serves, which, quite honestly, it does not do so well these days!). He had already done that by Matthew's age though. Matthew will get there I think.

I think it will be soon. He has had 3 nights on the trot where he's woken inexplicably and stayed awake for HOURS in the middle of the night, apparently unable to sleep. He hasn't done that for soooo long, and when he DID used to do that from time to time, it was always RIGHT before a new skill emerged. Usually a motor skill, like crawling or walking or rolling over, but not always. So I can't figure out any motor skills that he has yet to master (!). I wonder if it's talking that's about to happen? He DID start saying 3 new things just yesterday, and it's a reeally unusual thing to note the exact day that a new word is said by Matthew, let alone THREE! So maybe he is about to accelerate on the talking thing?

His new words were "Um-ma" (that's me, by the way :) His version of "mama"), "Ni-ni" or "Ni-nay" - that's Nathan!! I'm so excited about these first two!! And the third that day was "crane" pronounced very clearly (well, maybe a bit more like "gwane"!), about a picture of a crane in a story book!

Matthew is such a joy. I love him so much! He's always laughing or smiling, and it's always because he's being cheeky and mischievous and loving it! I love the sparkle in his eye. He is kind and sweet and gentle with his baby brother. Today he did have his first couple of not-so-good moments with Nathan though. Nathan was on the floor to have a nappy change, and I turned my back and Matthew hit him in the face with a toy car :( Nathan cried so hard. I wanted to throw Matthew out of the window! I get so fiercely protective towards my tiniest baby each time I have a new one. I can't help it. But I tried to be calm and handle him sensitively. He did get disciplined though.

And the other time, Matthew was being a bit whingey and he asked for milky (to nurse). I was nursing Nathan at the time, and Neil had almost served up dinner, so it was not the time to offer him the breast. I said he could have milky after dinner, when we went up for bedtime. He understands EVERYTHING by the way. He got cross and cried, and asked again (he says, "deh-dah" to ask, just to note here. "Deh-dah" is "breasty" which is what the boys call my breasts for some reason! I seem to recall Arthur pronounced it surprisingly similarly when he was younger). Anyway I said no, and he instantly got an angry expression and hit Nathan in the head as he nursed! *sigh*

Nathan's stirring again, still hasn't woken properly though, so I'll carry on.

Another thing I keep wanting to write about (especially when it's right in my face at the time!) is how.... difficult Arthur is being. I tell you, if I was writing an entry to vent about it at the time of frustration about it (as opposed to now, when I'm relatively removed from it, since he's been in bed asleep for 7 hours now!), I would be using words like "horrible" to describe him - things I sometimes read in other mummy blogs, but always felt I could never bear to use that kind of word to describe my own child, no matter how much I felt it to be true! It just doesn't feel right to use that kind of label out there in public about your own child. But I would have.

I fully understand his issues, really I do. We have a new baby. He is three. That explains it all, in a nutshell! But yeah, it's harrrd work with Arthur right now. And yet he can also be a complete sweetie and just normal "Arthur". The rest of the time he is really horrible, or certainly CAN be, and I LOVE him to bits and pieces but at the worst of these times I am finding it hard to like him, to like being around him, to WANT to be patient with him. He is so uncharacteristically (wow that's a long word, hehe!) aggressive, especially with Matthew. He head-butts, hits, kicks, pushes. Thankfully no biting. I couldn't stand him to bite! He is just frustrated with him messing his games up and stuff. And they get on wonderfully all the rest of the time, but there are just soooo many times during the day where they are aggressive with each other now, and they WILL. NOT. LISTEN. as we tell them to stop. We end up yelling to get their attention (a LOT these days, which I hate and it needs to change), and still they continue. We discipline them and they get it and eventually apologise and kiss better and all that stuff, but then they'll do it again 5 minutes later. It drives us crazy.

There's a ton of other stuff with Arthur right now, but no time to write about it. The way he is with us - I'm sure he's taking out any difficulties with Nathan's arrival on US instead of Nathan, and I'd MUCH prefer it that way. But it's hard. He's so RUDE and disrespectful, and laughs and mocks and sings rude and unkind songs if we hurt ourselves, etc. He shouts rudely over our talking. He goes out of his way to do stuff we don't want him doing - tearing a book, say, or dropping food on the floor when we just cleaned it. He won't come when asked, runs away when it's time to put shoes on/change nappy/have a bath, etc. He has started to be rude to people out and about, which is SO unlike him. He had to miss an outing for that, the next time we went out. I stayed at home with him while Neil took Matthew. He was really upset about it, but he totally GOT that it was due to his behaviour the previous time we took him out. He was very well behaved the next time!

He screams (I do mean scream) and cries as forcefully and exaggeratedly as he can for as LONG as he can carry it on, over tiny issues. The noise is enough to make me want to pull my skin off. He makes sure to make sudden loud noises when Matthew is trying to go down for his nap, and climbs and does all sorts of stuff that he KNOWS makes Matthew copy him, and which we have told them both NOT to do. The amount of time we are spending disciplining these kids is just staggering at the moment! It feels like we are doing little else some days, and that makes us think we're doing something wrong, or that it can't be right, etc. But at least we are being consistent.

Ugh.

It will pass though, right? I keep hearing that other people who have had 3-year-olds have had behaviour like this to deal with, even without a new baby, so it could be largely his age. He WAS like this before Nathan was born, but it's just got worse since.

He does seem to love Nathan though, and constantly asks to hold him. He throws a tantrum if I say he can't hold Nathan when he wants to (say if I'm about to nurse him, or it's bath time or Nathan's asleep in his cot, etc).

Thank God Neil is home still. I can't fathom managing the boys without him right now. I mean, seriously. I soooo hope things improve with them before Neil starts work again. Which, still no news on that front.

I am trusting God. I am starting to need to just repeat that out loud now, as things are getting a bit scary financially! I am trusting God. I am trusting God. He is faithful. He will not let us fall.

The other stuff I have been wanting to write about is regarding things to do with God. Mucho long-windedness is required and I don't have the time, even if Nathan were to stay asleep another 2 hours, hehe! I NEED to write about it in my diary, but I don't actually know how to tackle it. There are lots of parts to it. I don't know how to break them into manageable pieces!

If I bullet-point a few, maybe that'll serve to help me over the next few entries I write here? Or at least help me not forget what I meant to cover on the subject! And give an idea of what I am talking about.

Family. Babies. I need to link to a few blogs that are reeeeally challenging my thinking on some stuff. Neil and I are going to set aside some time soon to pray about it. We have decided we need to ask God how many children HE wants us to have. He might not tell us a number, but we need to pray about it. I don't think we should be calling the shots any more.

No time for more detail, but have been praying - Neil has too, about the same thing but on his own. And baby number four? When HE happens? I don't know how to explain it, but both of us just "know" from our own individual prayer times that baby number 4 will be a boy, and both of us feel that he will be a boy called Benjamin. It's an amazing feeling to think that I've just had Nathan, and yet already I know we are simply waiting for Benjamin! It feels wonderful! :) I started to talk to God about having a girl. I don't have a mega urge that I MUST have a daughter. But I asked God if he would give me a baby girl. And before the question was even finished on my lips, I KNEW the next baby was already Benjamin. I'll eat my hat if it's not, when it comes to it! ;) So, I paused at that realisation, and said, "Okay God, thank you for Benjamin! Now, if it pleases you to give me a baby girl after Benjamin...." :) I am praying for a girl for my fifth baby. I have noooo vibes about babies after Benjamin, but Benjamin feels like he's already as real as my children who are already born. It's something I can't describe properly here, and Neil feels exactly the same way. Today Neil came to me and said he had wondered about whether we might have twin girls after Benjamin! Weirdly, I vaguely daydreamed the same exact thing this morning while nursing Nathan :)

Okay, Nathan is waking properly now, I think. It's after 3am, ugh!

Ooh! It's my birthday!!!!! D'you know, this is the first year that I have really not thought much about my birthday approaching. I guess I am a bit busy right now! That's probably why. But I suddenly realised it was going to be my birthday, a few days ago, and it felt so weird to suddenly realise it, so close to the date. For me, anyway.

No plans for my birthday - well, the mother's group (Fellowship Group) at church is meeting at the park for a walk with their little ones, at 9.45am (sooooo early, I still need to sleep when Nathan lets me during the morning to catch up from the night!). I forgot it was my birthday when I said I'd go, but it doesn't really change anything. I still plan to go, but I'm not sure I'll be up to it with how late it is and how my sleep will probably be very broken once I get to have some - Nathan wakes to nurse very frequently still.

I'm 32!! Or I will be, at 11.25am :) I really thought I'd have a VERY new baby on my birthday, maybe less than a week old! But Nathan is nearly 6 weeks old already. He still FEELS very new. He's my favourite birthday present, then! My boys are just the best gift from God, ever. I'm so thrilled with them (hard work and all!)!

My sweet baby boy!!! I love him soooo! Thank you God for blessing me so very much this past year. I'm excited for another year of blessings to come! I'm happy to be 32. I'm always happy to be whatever age I'm arriving at each birthday. I love being even-numbered ages though, for some reason! It must be a leap year! D'uh, of course it is. I was born on a leap year so when my age is divisible by four, it's a leap year :) That's how I remember when they are, hehe! I love 32! I love the number. I'm excited to be this age! It feels like an age where life is really happening and it couldn't get more exciting than that! What a great age to beeee! :)

A few Arthur things...

I seem to have no time at all to write here! I am still writing at my pregnancy diary when I do get time, because Nathan is still in that "newborn" window where I update there about my new baby :) I will probably keep writing about him there for another month or so maybe. I do have things that I keep wanting to write here, and I really don't like letting them slide by, because then they just leave my memory banks completely.

So, I have maybe five/fifteen/0.01 minutes (!!), and I wanted to jot a few things down here while I can, to make note of them while they are still "news"!

Arthur had a few firsts lately!

On Sunday when we went to church, he had his first session at Sunday School! He has been in creche all this time. They take kids up to age 3 - well, the first group at Sunday School is for kids aged 3-5. They won't take them before their 3rd birthday. After Arthur turned 3, they were rehearsing for the Christmas Nativity play and Rachel (who leads it) said that it would be better for Arthur to join the group in January, as he would come in when they were getting back to normal things again. Then of course, in January, I went and had a baby without warning anyone! ;) So, we didn't go to church much in January.

The Sunday before last, I told Arthur that he could go to the "big group" with Joshie (his favourite friend, who is 5 months older than Arthur and has been in that group since the summer), or he could stay in creche. By the time I went to remind him when it came time for the groups to start during the service, he was already in the creche room, busily drawing with crayons. But after church he reminded me that he was supposed to go to "big school" (bless him, I don't know why he calls it that!). Last Sunday when we went to church, I asked him if he would like to go to creche as usual, or if he would like me to take him to the big boys' group. It isn't just for boys, of course! But for some reason it is all boys (except for one girl, who wasn't there today) in that age range.

Anyway he said yes. Once we got in there, he went soooo shy! He hung back with his ENTIRE hand in his mouth, just toooo shy to take part, which I found interesting, as I was never sure how Arthur would be in a new setting like that. He's a very confident and outgoing little boy, and I had often wondered if he'd be shy EVER, but he has his moments sometimes. I stayed the whole time, and will do so for the next two or three sessions. After that I'll see if he's happy for me to leave. He wouldn't sit down at the table with the group till Joshie patted the chair next to him and said softly, "Come on, Arthur!" He's such a sweet little boy!

I had Nathan in my arms the whole time but he slept soundly so that was okay. Anyway it went great! They learned about the good Samaritan. They had a discussion about what it means to be kind versus mean (soooo apt for Arthur right now *sigh*). They cut pictures from the story and put them in the correct order. Rachel assigned a helper to Arthur to help him with cutting and ordering the story, but I told her that he could cut well, and he DID! I was so proud! :) He cut fast and on all the lines. They seemed quite surprised by how well he could cut :) I asked him which picture came first, and which one came next, etc, and he very quickly put them all in the right order without making any mistakes. So I was pleased that he could get stuck in with the work without being a bit behind in terms of skills learned, etc. Or being a bit young for it, and so on. That was a relief for me. They also did cutting and sticking and drawing (kind faces), and he LOVED that. He drew his first actual picture of a recognisable thing! Arthur's drawing isn't anywhere near what most 3-year-olds are drawing, I think. He hasn't yet done more than scribbles, although he can draw shapes (triangles, squares and circles). He asked me how old I was the other day, and I said 31. He wanted to write it! I carefully drew the number 3 for him to copy, and he said, "I've already done the 1..." and he had, with the little folded-down thing at the top of it too! He did a pretty good 3.

Anyway but he hasn't drawn faces, people, objects, anything like that. He will tell me he's drawing something, and it's just a bunch of scribbles to look at. I know other 3-year-olds who are drawing real stick people with smiley faces and hair, hehe! He'll get there. Perhaps I don't give him enough opportunities, or the right kind of encouragement? Anyway. So he drew a "kind face" - a circle with two slits for eyes, a line for a nose, a round mouth, and then added two lines sticking out of the bottom of the face, declaring, "That's the feet!" :) I was overjoyed!

They did singing with rhythm sticks - a pair for each child. Ohhhh he loved that! Banging things as loud as he could, and being encouraged to do so, hehe! They learned a Bible verse with the rhythm sticks, and listened to the story of the good Samaritan. At the end there was a prayer time, and to me, this was the BEST bit! Because Rachel asked if there was anything anybody wanted to pray about. A little boy stood up to show everyone a big plaster on his side, lifting up his top so we could all see. And another said he had a sore leg. Then - how precious! - the boy with the sore leg (who is 5), closed his eyes and prayed out loud that God would make his sore leg better! And another boy prayed as well. I think that was a real eye-opener for Arthur. I don't think he had any concept of children praying before. I pray with him every day and sometimes ask him if he wants to pray, but he always quickly says, "No, you." and so I do. I won't push him to pray. We also say grace at mealtimes (but honestly, we've only recently started, because we are shamefully forgetful about that usually), and usually ask, "Who wants to say thank you to God for our food?" and he always pipes up, "Mummy!" or "Daddy!" :)

Anyway, so he watched and listened. Yesterday at dinner, Arthur said, "Today, I'm going to be the one to pray!" We closed our eyes and waited, and then Arthur prayed, and honestly I could have burst into tears, my heart was so overflowing. His voice got all shy and quiet, and he said, "Lord.... thank you for our food... and..... Lord.... thank you that we like it. Amen." We found it so sweet that he said "Lord", just like we often do when we are praying aloud. Also, so cute that he thanked God that we liked our food, because he was sitting with a plate in front of him, containing a single piece of dry bread! As usual, he wouldn't eat the chicken casserole I made, and had his usual bread "with NO butter!". I also noted that yesterday was the first evening that I can remember where he hasn't rudely complained about the food. He didn't use the word "yuck" once. Which is a HUGE deal for Arthur, believe me! *sigh*

Tonight he wanted to say grace again :) It's so so so sweet to hear him pray!

I can't remember what the other "first" for Arthur was lately... if there even was one. Nathan just woke up crying so I have to stop for now. I'll try to write more bits and pieces soon!

Three children, aged three and under!

It's 11pm. I am really happy right now. My cute, snuggly newborn is 20 days old - he's 3 weeks old tomorrow. He is sleeping on his daddy's chest in the armchair. I have a precious, intelligent, difficult 3-year-old who is sleeping in a big co-sleeping floor bed upstairs. And a scrumptious, funny, mischievous 19-month-old who has woken totally inconsolable this evening and taken half our "adult" evening to resettle.

I know my husband is home from work all the time. I know I get to take a morning nap when I have been up half the night breastfeeding. I know I have it easy right now, as far as support and practical help goes. I know that pretty soon (we hope!) Neil will get a job and I'll be looking after 3 children aged 3 and under all day, every day (except weekends!) without an ounce of help. That should scare me silly! It DID, a couple of days ago.

But today, I don't know. I feel so confident. I really really believe I can DO this. And more.

Okay, so I am listening to Billy Joel's "Uptown Girl" on repeat at YouTube - I just LOVE that song for some reason! I was 7 years old when it was released and it was played EVERYWHERE. I remember going swimming and it was playing while I was in the pool, MANY weekends running (we used to go swimming as a family every Sunday). I am pretty sure it was playing at my 8th birthday party, which was a swimming party (I think it was that year anyway...). I have a ton of fond memories of life while that music was around! Also I just love the song. It’s catchy and bouncy and 80s-ish, and I LOVE it! It cheers me up on a bad day, anytime. Today is not even a bad day! So perhaps that accounts for my upbeat mood?!

Anyway. I know this is temporary. Even a Super-Mummy is going to have BAD BAD days and feel despairing and overwhelmed. I know I will have them, and I will be back here before I know it, writing about how it’s impossible to cope with 3 kids at once, so young, and I will never survive the day, etc, etc. I know those days are coming. But I also know I can do this.

I feel so excited about my situation! I feel so proud of what I am doing with my life. I am a Mummy, like I always wanted to be. But I NEVER for a nanosecond thought I would ever have kids so close together! Ever. My children are 3 years and 2 months, 19 months, and almost 3 weeks old! I have 3 aged 3 and under! I know I am in the hardest season of parenting, right now. Maybe it could get more difficult actually, when I still have 3 aged 3 and under, but all 3 are mobile and I’m trying to potty train two of them? Anyway. This is the hardest season. I have been reading things about having lots of little ones close together, and how it’s a season. It FEELS long and drawn-out, but it’s fleeting. Then you miss it, even the hard parts. Maybe this is helping my perspective right now?

If you are out there with a 2 year old and a baby, and expecting another, and you haven’t already read Amy’s Humble Musings (I have already, shamefully, forgotten which wonderful person gave me the link to this blog in my comments here once – but thank you, so much!), I wholeheartedly recommend her series on living with three under three. It’s been so encouraging to me (there are 8 parts so far). Amy has 6 children aged 9 and under. The best parts are actually in the comments – there are soooo many, from other mothers who have weathered the many-young-children phase, and they give some great advice. It has blessed me so much that I am going to post a link to each of Amy’s parts to her series:

Living with 3 under 3: Part One
Living with 3 under 3: Part Two
Living with 3 under 3: Part Three
Living with 3 under 3: Part Four
Living with 3 under 3: Part Five
Living with 3 under 3: Part Six
Living with 3 under 3: Part Seven
Living with 3 under 3: Part Eight

I’m just so encouraged to be reminded that this IS the most difficult part of parenthood, it’s not just the way it feels to me. I don’t quite have three under three, but near enough. Arthur only turned 3 two months ago. I think if I ever ACTUALLY have three under three, it will be harder than this! Especially since I will also be homeschooling the older ones! But anyway. It’s not easy! Most of the mothers say that adding a fourth, fifth or sixth child is easy as pie in comparison, which is another encouragement to me, since that’s what I’m hoping to do! :) Anyway, this hard stage is just a season, and I WILL survive it. And my children will too. And will not be traumatised for the experience! I will learn patience and grace and a good many other things that I am SURE that God is waiting to teach me on this journey. Things I reeeeally need to learn!

The other day, Neil had to go out for a few hours to pick up our BIG family car (it’s a Chrysler Grand Voyager, an MPV with 7 seats! I feel so.... awed , that I have enough children to warrant an MPV, hehe!). We won it at eBay. Now, you’ll think we’re crazy (we are, I’m afraid), but we got it so cheap that we’re going to sell it :) The night after we won this Chrysler Grand Voyager (in totally yucko colours inside and out), we decided to bid on another! We won as well! The second one we won is in even better condition (though the first is also in brilliant condition). It has lower mileage and is a pale silvery purple with grey leather inside. It’s GORGEOUS :) There is about £100 worth of minor damage to the side of the first one we bought, and we plan to have that fixed, clean it up well (it wasn’t cleaned prior to selling), and re-sell it. We are hoping to get at least £500 profit. We are also selling the car we’ve been driving since Matthew was almost due, and that should fetch us about £1000 more than we paid for the first Chrysler, so HOPEFULLY when we’ve finished selling two cars and we’ve got the second Chrysler that we won, we’ll have a great family car AND £1000 - £1,500 in the bank. That would reeeally help us right now. Now that we’ve bought two large cars (!!), we need to sell asap. Neil is getting the Ford ready to sell this week, and hopefully it will sell quite quickly. We are expecting to pick up the second Chrysler next week, and as soon as we’ve put the kids’ car seats in it, we’ll get the first Chrysler ready to sell and try to get it sold quickly.

Anyway, bit of an aside there! So Neil had to go into London to pick up the car. I came over kind of cold and clammy at the thought of him LEAVING ME for more than 10 minutes, haha! Seriously though, I did. I knew I had to get used to it though, so a couple of hours would be GOOD practise. I was sooooooo nervous as we waved him off down the road! It’s so silly of me! They’re my own children, and there really isn’t anything to be scared of! But yeah.

It went okay! I surprised myself! I found that I could discipline a child whilst holding a tiny baby. And multi-task in general waaaay more than I realised. Matthew napped at his normal time, though Neil was here when he went down for his nap, so I didn’t manage that on my own! But then Nathan went to sleep, and I took him upstairs and put him asleep on the big floor bed. I covered him with his blanket and left him there! It was an “a-ha!” moment, because I realised I needed to put him to bed when he had fallen asleep, and be okay with walking away and going to another part of the house without him! It’s so alien to me to be physically separated from Nathan yet. He should still be in my tummy after all! But it was FINE. Nathan and Matthew slept an hour at the same time. It didn’t really hit me until I was downstairs with Arthur and we had some one-on-one time, which felt really comfortable and familiar as though I had stepped back in time to before I had Nathan. It was a strange but lovely feeling, and I’m sure Arthur enjoyed it too! A bit later on, Arthur was making a ton of noise (making siren sounds, and so on!) and I asked him to be a little quieter, because “the two little ones are asleep upstairs” – and the moment I said it, I kind of sat back in shock at the realisation! I hadn’t really realised how the moment has ARRIVED – I really have three little children, and I can say, “the two little ones” without meaning ALL my children!! It’s soooo surreal. And also, it’s something I feel sooo incredibly happy and proud about!

It got slightly hairier after the little ones woke up, and I could NOT get to make dinner for the kids, no matter how I tried I could not get further than getting a couple of dishes out and putting them on the surface! I had a baby in my arms or in the sling (need to find a place to put him safely when he’s down with us and awake), and the other two would not stop climbing furniture or headbutting each other, or screaming fit to burst each others’ ear drums, etc. So I had to keep stopping, and I realised I could NOT cook a meal. Thankfully I knew Neil would be home in time to help me before they got toooo late for their dinner! I need to figure something out about that, for when Neil is working again and ISN’T home to help me make dinner! Hmmm!

Today Neil had to go out again for a bit, and that was fine too. A challenge, but fine. He took Arthur with him, so actually it wasn’t all that much of a challenge as it seems! Matthew woke up after his nap and was inconsolable (I hope he’s not coming down with something), and Nathan was awake and crying, so I put Nathan in Matthew’s cot, and carried Matthew downstairs to comfort him and get him a drink and a snack. Eventually Matthew calmed down and I went up to retrieve Nathan (who, thankfully, had not become hysterical in my absence – just puked a bit on Matthew’s sheets!). The funny thing (to me!) is that while I was dealing with the two little ones, I suddenly thought how much easier it was to handle two under two, than all three together. And then I remembered the early days/weeks when Matthew was tiny, and the many times I wrote here about being completely overwhelmed and unable to manage. And I said how it was surely IMPOSSIBLE to manage looking after two children under two – how on earth does anyone juggle their needs?! So it made me smile to have the “luxury” of only having my two littlest to watch, my “two under two”, and thinking how easy it was, hehe! I am sure when I have another baby that I’ll look back and think “only” having three little ones was easy in comparison!

Okay, Nathan is waking, so I need to finish this.

I am so broody again. I always am by this stage postpartum – by about 2 weeks after giving birth actually. It was 8 days this time ;) I can’t fathom ever having a girl, but right now that is fine and dandy with me. I think we are missing a Benjamin. I can’t seem to shake it actually. Neil is someone who has trouble with names. He is forever mixing up the boys’ names! When Nathan was about a week old, Neil kept on calling him Benjamin, and saying to me that he couldn’t understand why he was calling him Benjamin! Benjamin is my next favourite boys’ name, personally :) In fact, I had it in mind for the next boy after I had Matthew. I didn’t think of Nathan right away, and was thinking of Benjamin from early on in my pregnancy with Nathan. But I didn’t like Ben so much, so I went off it a bit, and then we discovered/remembered we both loved the name Nathan :) But I feel sure we are missing a Benjamin. I feel like he is coming next, and I’m already excited about meeting him and seeing who he’s like and what he looks like! I know I’m probably crazy. But oh well! :P

Don't worry. I haven't completely lost the plot! I KNOW I will have bad days and not be able to fathom having any more babies for the time being! And feel like a bad mummy, toooo bad to manage any more little ones. But I know that will just be because I'm overwhelmed, and I know that's normal, because other mothers are out there having the same challenges, and I take SUCH comfort knowing that THIS is the hardest part. Right now, I am busy enjoying my boys and snuggling my new baby, and letting the house BE a pigsty (for now - I am slowly starting up my FlyLady routines again, bit by bit). I do have a list that I made each day, of six things that need doing. I don't expect to do them all, but it helps me to have a list to work through. With the help of lists, just today and yesterday, I have changed Matthew's cot sheets, and Arthur's bed sheets. And phoned the dentist to make an appt (can't bite food on one side of my mouth for the last month or so, as one of my teeth is HURTING when I do, hmmm!), and the Registry Office to make an appt to go and register Nathan's birth. And yesterday I ran the dishwasher and did a dark load of laundry (those were pressing things). Today I used two ageing lemons to make four lemon sponge puddings - one that we ate for dessert after dinner tonight, and the other three are in the freezer :) So the lists are helping. The house is a tip, but I'm trying not to let it bother me. It's not the time to worry about it, and I'll get there eventually.

Nathan is looking like he needs some mummy milk, so I'm going to finish this and nurse my sweet tiny boy! I am breastfeeding all three of my lovely boys, and sooooo proud! On February 13th, I will have been pregnant or breastfeeding, or both, for exactly four years, as it will be four years to the day since I ovulated and Arthur was conceived! :)

I am sorry to have been away from this diary a bit lately, with all the newsy stuff in my pregnancy diary. I plan to update here more often, if I can, even if it's just bits of news. Ooh, talking of which - Neil has found a job to apply for (at last!), and we are really hoping he'll get it. It's based in London, and pays better than he's earned before. And he's actually interested in the job, so that's a bonus! We don't know what God has planned for us, but we DO know that we are about to be completely out of money (including credit card "funds") and still have a mortgage to pay and bills, and little mouths (mouthes?) to feed. So he MUST earn some money soon. We will have no more money to pay the mortgage after the end of February. We will have maxed out our credit cards by then. Please pray that God will bless us with an income soon! And even that he'll be successful in applying for this job in London. I know it might not be the one God has planned for him. But we just don't know! So we'll pray that he gets it all the same. If he doesn't, I know it's because God has something better planned. I just hope it's soon! In a month's time, if he doesn't have a job it will get very scary.

My tiniest boy has arrived!

Just a quick entry (really!) to make note in this diary of our big news (links to more detailed diary entries included)!

Nathan arrived a month early! My waters broke on Friday (Jan 11th), and I was induced the same afternoon because I'm GBS positive and needed antibiotics once my waters broke.

Nathan Martin was born at 5.42am on Saturday January 12th. I wrote about that part in this entry. He was born a month before his due date (he was due Feb 10th) at 35 weeks and 6 days gestation. He weighed 5lbs 13oz, and was 19 inches long, which was pretty good for his gestation! I think he would have been my heaviest baby yet, had he gone to term.

He had no breathing problems, no blood sugar problems, and was able to stay with me for the few days we were in hospital. He didn't maintain his body temperature too well in the first 24 hours, but he was fine after that. I had to supplement him with small amounts of formula in the hospital to keep his blood sugar levels steady. My milk came in during the evening on Day 3, after we arrived home from hospital, so he isn't getting formula top ups any more. He is nursing plenty, and Matthew too. I love tandem nursing! Arthur decided my new milky tasted yucky and disgusting (!), and wouldn't nurse any more. He seemed quite unhappy about it, as though he really WANTED to keep nursing but didn't like the taste. He seemed to be the one dealing LEAST well with having a new baby brother. Matthew is eager and excited, and VERY sweet and gentle with Nathan. He calls him "dee-dee" (baby) and strokes his hair sooooo softly, saying, "Deh-doh" (gentle). He wants to see Nathan every single opportunity he gets.

Yesterday evening Arthur asked for milky at bedtime. I asked if he was sure, and he said yes. When it was in full flow, he seemed not-so-happy about being on the breast drinking it, but he continued anyway. After he finished, I asked him how he felt about Mummy's milky tonight. He said it was yummy again and that he wanted to have milky all the time again now :) He has nursed quite a few times today, and as usual at bedtime, with no problems. He declares that it's yummy every time. I think we're back on with the tandem (triandum?!) nursing, and I'm happy about that. I think it will help Arthur to bond with Nathan. Already today, when Matthew was napping, I was nursing Nathan and Arthur together, and Arthur was acting WAY more calm around him (he's been a bit boisterous and aggressive and fidgetty around Nathan thus far) and gently playing with Nathan's fingers while they nursed. So that is good!

I wrote another diary entry from the hospital before we left, and then a big entry with the first photos of Nathan. I will keep updating about my tiniest boy at my pregnancy journal, like I usually do, until he's 6 weeks old. Then I will (sadly, as always!) close things down there till next time (ohhh I hope there will be one!), and continue to update about ALL my boys here! This diary sometimes gets a bit neglected while I'm writing about a new tiny person (and his brothers) at my pregnancy diary, so do check there as I write a lot of stuff there that really ought to belong here, during that time! I have a lot more photos to post there soon, but haven't finished uploading and resizing yet. We are not getting a lot of sleep at the moment. I need to write about that there, too.

But I have THREE sons! I have ALL my boys! I am sooooo blessed! I love each of them so very much, and I can't believe this is my life, and they are MY children! I am just in awe. Thank you Lord, for the safe arrival of another precious baby boy, and for blessing me with each of my children. Please help me to be the best mother I can be to them, and to parent them lovingly and sensitively. Help me to meet each of their needs and learn to juggle caring for three. Keep me from hormonal issues in the next few months, and equip me for everything that will be demanded of me! Help me lean on you above all. I need you more than ever. I love you Lord! I just want to praise you for your faithfulness to me, and your loving kindness. You are all I could ever need. Amen.