Big update part two, and more photos

Another entry at last, yay! Not sure how long for though, because it's after 10pm and Arthur is weirdly wakeful this evening. He has woken twice this evening already, crying for me and wanting to nurse. He has been all soaked with sweat both times so maybe that's all that woke him. I hope he's okay. He's teething STILL, and seems quite bothered by it all the time really. His nasty nappy rash has at least eased off for the time being, but his cheeks are red and it looks like his gums are sore. He is working on his eye teeth (canines). He has one bottom one fully through, another bottom one half through, the little white tip of a top one poking through, and a very red swollen gum where the fourth one will soon be. Poor Boo. But after these, there will only be the 2-year-old molars to go - four more teeth and he is FINISHED with baby teeth!! Yay! I will be so pleased, really. He has had a horrible time with teething since he was 10 weeks old.

Speaking of which, Matthew is nearly 11 weeks old now and has been pretty obviously teething for the past week or so. This week he has been worse than last week, and today and yesterday we actually had to give him a mini dose of teething powder. He has been drooling like CRAZY for a couple of weeks, and chewing on his hands now that he's found them. The last couple of days, he has made his index finger red and puffy with how hard he's biting it. Neil gave him his knuckle to bite on this afternoon when he was crying and crying and CRYING, and he went all quiet and gummed Neil's knuckle for like 10 minutes straight, as hard as he could. He also has a bit of a nappy rash this evening which I reckon could be part of it all. Poor babies! I ordered some teething rings for him, with my online order of oven locks and oven knob covers, etc, which have suddenly become necessary with our new oven! Its door and knobs turn and open sooooooo smoothly and easily and Arthur just keeps on fiddling with it. We tell him no and take him away from it, etc, and he generally minds us but then when we're not there for a moment he'll still go and play with it. I found him shoving his ride-on car in the oven yesterday with great effort and concentration! So we decided to be safe and order an oven lock (which I hope will fit) and some covers for the oven knobs). He knows not to go near the oven when it's on because he understands the concept of it being hot and that he can get hurt.

Anyway, so yeah, teething boys. But we're all okay other than that. Neil and I are tired out of our MINDS, but that's the way it goes at the moment. Neil feels like he's getting a cold this evening. Urgh. I hope he isn't. We REALLY don't need to get sick with anything right now.

We took the boys for their immunisations last week but the appts were mixed up (my fault, I think??) and I had the wrong time, so it turned out that we had MISSED their appointments a couple of hours earlier - I felt soooo bad. Three other people could have had appts that covered our big jab session! And we were just a no-show, that's so bad. We waited a while in case the nurse could manage to see us anyway, but she was out until her next clinic started, so we had to reschedule. The next available appointment was SEPTEMBER 13TH!!!! I'm so annoyed, that is such a long wait when Matthew is behind on his immunisations already and I had really wanted to get Arthur protected with the MMR before we started going to playgroups when the start up again in September. But oh well.

We did get to see the Health Visitor though, and she weighed Matthew again for me. He weighed 11lbs 13oz (exactly a whole pound lighter than Arthur at the exact same age!) and that puts him at around the 25th percentile again. She said he looks healthy and happy, and she isn't concerned about his weight gain. She wants to see him again in a month, or for me to take him to the drop-in baby clinic in a few weeks.

Arthur is awake AGAIN - only 30 minutes after the last time. Hmmm. Hopefully he'll settle back to sleep easily - Neil is in there with him now.

Anyway, it looks like Matthew has chosen the 25th percentile, since he has been there for the last two weigh-ins, which is fine. I just still feel a LITTLE bit concerned, since the last time, he was just above the 25th, and this time he was just below it. He is difficult to feed - I mean, he is not a big eater. Soooo different to Arthur! He won't feed for long, and he's fidgetty while he does. Today has been particularly difficult, and I feel like he hasn't really had much milk today at all, as all his feeds have been very brief and on-and-off-ish, and it has been very hard to keep him on the breast for more than a minute or so. He did have a long feed at bedtime though, and went to sleep on the breast (which hardly ever happens) and actually pulled off in his sleep when another let-down of milk happened, so I know he had had enough milk that time. He seems full at the end of these ridiculously short and fidgetty feeds though, and burps and brings up some milk, etc. He doesn't seem hungry again for a few hours afterwards. But they are so SHORT, surely he can't be getting enough, or enough of the right kind of milk?! His poo is normal though. He gets hind milk for sure when he is on a breast that Arthur just had a feed from too. Anyway, I just hope he isn't gaining too little and dropping down that percentile chart even more. I shouldn't obsess over the darn chart, I know, but I can't seem to help dwelling on it a little. Tsk.

One thing about Matthew is, he is MUCH more eager to talk than eat! Arthur was the kind of baby who would rather eat than do ANYTHING, hehe! Matthew can wake up after a LONG stretch without milk, suck luxuriously for a minute or so, and then turn his eyes up towards my face, realise I'm there, and then he can't seem to stay on the breast, such is his eagerness to smile and coo and "chat" with me! He tries to talk around the nipple but that doesn't really work! I chat and smile with him for a while, but then sometimes I have to tell him, "Focus on your milk, Matthew, we have plenty of time to talk in a minute!" and look over at something else for a moment. I hate looking away from him when he is trying to smile and "talk" with me, but I do it when he has hardly started his feed but won't continue for wanting to talk with me. He gets back to feeding till I look at him again, and then he breaks off to coo and smile and stuff :) He's a sweetie. His latest thing is blowing raspberries and bubbles. Arthur never blew actual raspberries with his tongue, but Matthew loves doing it, and if I do it back to him his little face lights up like a Christmas tree and he beams and beams at me. He loves raspberries :)

I am sooooooooooo behind on photos, but I have been meaning to write about what Arthur is doing lately, because he's changing so much all the time and I know if I don't write it down NOW, he'll change again and I'll forget this stage ever happened. So I want to write about it. Thing is, there's SO much to write about, and I'm not sure where to start after all this time not updating.

Let's see. He knows SUCH a lot of colours! I can't remember the ones I already said he knew a month or so ago. Over the last month he will accurately point out items in the colours: red, yellow, orange, pink, blue, green, aqua, brown, black, white, purple, beige, grey, silver, gold and turquoise. He did learn tan, but I think he has forgotten that one now. This last couple of weeks, we have taught him navy, khaki and maroon. I just tell him colours of things as he's playing with them, like, where I used to say, "Oh, you've got your car!" I now say, "Oh, you've got your red car!", etc. Or I ask him, "Where's your purple cup?" and he'll fetch it. When he used to fetch me a green cup instead, I would say, "Oh good boy, that's your cup, but it's not the purple one - that's the green one". He has this toy car in a really dark green. Lately all very dark colours are "dack" (black) so I thought I might as well teach him that there's such a thing as light and dark in the same colour. Yesterday he held up that toy car and said, "Geem!" so I told him it WAS green, but it was DARK green. That evening he held it out to me again and said, "Daah geem!" and he has done that twice today as well. He's very pleased with his daah geem car at the moment, hehe! A few weeks ago, he was pointing at all the things on the sofa and naming their colours (he loves naming colours on the things he sees these days - he will do it on walks, during ANY activity in the house, in the car, in picture books, etc), and he pointed at the sofa cushion and said something that I didn't hear properly, so I absent-mindedly said, "Yes, RED, clever boy" and he gave me a scornful look and pointed again and said, "Ni-MOOM" in a very direct tone! He was correcting me! The cushion was indeed more of a maroon colour than red. I was boggled, seriously. That boy is a smartie-pants :)

He is saying SO many words, more and more every day it seems. His words aren't clear and easy to understand though. He says them consistently but they come out sort of like "ni-moom" for "maroon" - almost there, but really you'd have to be Mummy or Daddy to understand it straight away! He keeps saying things I am SURE we haven't taught him. He has plastic fruit and veg in one of his toy boxes and he was sifting through them a couple of weeks ago. He suddenly plucked out the peach and brandished it at me excitedly, and said, "Peepf!" I have NO idea how he knew that word - we never have peaches, we hadn't played with that toy fruit for MONTHS, and I don't remember seeing any references to peaches on the TV while he has been around. Weird.

I LOVE the way he pronouces things! His words are soooo cute! Like "peepf", that's one of my favourites! Another of my favourites is "bwips" (bricks). His little voice is so tiny and chipmunky, and I love how over-exaggerated his consonants are and how long and careful some of his vowel sounds are. I love how he tries so hard to make a vocal sound that he hasn't mastered yet, like the "ch" sound in peach, and it comes out all cute instead :) I know it'll change before I know it and get pronounced all normally and the cuteness will become less and less, and so I am just cherishing all these little newnesses while they're still new. Neil and I both feel that we'll be so sad when he learns to pronounce his name more clearly. He still says, "Aaah-yah!" for "Arthur" at the moment, and we love it! I wonder how Matthew will pronounce his name? Or Arthur's name, for that matter!

Matthew is starting to stir in the cot so I'm not sure if I've got much longer. His nights are the same as when I last wrote - a good block of sleep during the evening, usually 5 or 6 hours (though it was 7 and a half last night!!!) and then 3-hourly-ish after that first waking. He slept with me the whole night a few nights ago, because I was soooo tired I just couldn't stay awake while I was breastfeeding him in bed. All his night feeds are snuggled up against me in my bed, and then I sit up, burp him, and pop him back in his cot which is pushed right up against my bed. I have to admit, I really miss the snuggly closeness of co-sleeping with Matthew, but I need the space to sleep, and he seems happy as anything in his cot so it's working well for both of us. But I still sometimes miss the closeness of co-sleeping. It's so special. *sigh* I LOVE that I breastfeed him in bed at night though :) I'm glad we still have SOME snuggle time in bed at night!

Okay, some photos, before I run out of time! Here's one of Arthur just over a month ago, building a Mega Bloks tower! He loves building, but lately he is getting more and more easily frustrated with building. I think it's that stage where they get easily frustrated and have tantrums, etc, that's causing it. A brick will not go on properly and he'll smash the whole thing down, crying and screeching at it. Or he'll build it high and then it will topple before he's finished, and he's just angry and distraught about it. Poor lovey, it's such a hard stage to go through, learning about life's frustrations! I feel bad for him, because I know he only has outbursts and tantrums because things get on top of him and he doesn't know how to manage his emotions yet. That's all it is. It's hard for him. It'll pass, and each tantrum blows over, but it's still hard for him to be this age. I don't know why they call it the "terrible twos". I don't know ANYONE whose child has not been going through it BEFORE the age of two. It's just a toddler phenomenon, rather than specific to the age of two, that's all. Anyway. My toddler is frustrated a lot these days, and life is hard for him to feel in control of. I need to give him more of a sense of structure, I think. Toddlers thrive on structure, and I read that it helps them to feel more in control, so I must try to help him with that.

Anyway, I digress. I meant to post the photo of Arthur building a particularly huge tower! Here it is :)

He LOVES playing with his toy cars. He has loads of cars and trucks and lorries and emergency vehicles. I got him a pretty good selection of matchbox type toy cars, and he just adores them. He plays with them for ages, just running them around the floor or the furniture, or poking them into small spaces, naming their colours, or just naming the specific vehicles. He says, "car" properly, but his other pronounciations are hard for anyone else to know what he is saying. Lorry is "yah-yah", ambulance is "ahh-dan", police car is "na-na" for some reason! Fire engine is "en-nee". He has been consistent with these pronounciations for these words for a couple of months now, so we are very familiar with them, but nobody else knows what he's talking about, poor Arthur! One of his favourite things to do with his vehicles is make a long line of them somewhere - preferably along the shelf on his toy unit. He LOVES doing this, and spends ages lining them up and when the line is full he will carefully select one car to remove and replace with another one, complete with very cute serious commentary to himself as he does it, and "hmmm" sounds as he thinks about which cars to move, hehe! I managed to take a photo of him doing this a few weeks ago:

Arthur is showing some signs of getting ready for potty training, and he has been showing some of them for a couple of months now, but I am still not convinced it's time to act on it yet. He is still so little, and I am in no rush to see him leave behind his lovely cloth nappies! It's hard having two full time in cloth nappies, but I still love it to BITS, and will be sad when he is done with them! I know it's only been 10 weeks, but I still think it's going to seem really odd to suddenly only have one child in nappies and only one baby's cloth nappies to wash again! I'm so used to the vast quantities of two little people's cloth nappies to wash, and I love it! Plus I still have some sewing projects that are half done, nappies for Arthur - or fabric that I am LONGING to make into nappies or wraps for him, and I know Matthew will grow into them one day anyway, but I will feel sad to never get round to those projects before he's done with nappies!

Anyway, I don't think he's done with them for a while yet, but still, he's definitely showing some signs of readiness. Not ALL the signs, but plenty of them all the same. He can (and does) pull his nappies up and down. He can control it when he wees, if he's peeing on the carpet and I ask him to stop, he does so immediately. I should point out, this is a rare occurrance! He very occasionally wees during his short nappy-free time before a bath, but I'm beginning to read his body language and know when he needs to wee when he is having nappy-free time. I ask him and he doesn't answer me yes or no yet. But he does tell me when he's done a poo, IMMEDIATELY that he's done one. He has only started doing that in the last few days - well, he's been telling me that he's done a poo, or needs to do a poo, for a while, but not right away. Now he comes and finds me and gets my attention so that he can give me a very serious look and say solemnly, "Poo." ;)

He seems to be hating nappy changes more and more (he never used to mind them at all), and especially hates being changed when he's done a poo, even though he wants to be in a clean nappy really. He likes to sit on his potty, and he knows what it's for. He makes such cute little pretend effort noises when he sits there, as if he's pretending to poo or wee, hehehe! He has never done anything on the potty though, and we never make anything of it. We ask him if he's doing a wee-wee or a poo-poo, but just casually as though we're asking him if he's cooking when he stirs an empty saucepan with a wooden spoon. I don't want to push him at ALL over potty training. I'd much rather he leads us through it, but I don't actually know HOW to potty train a child. I guess I should read up a bit and find out how it works. But for now, I'm just glad that he's relaxed with the potty. Except that sometimes he is um, perhaps a little TOO relaxed there, and wants to sit on it while he eats, etc, hahaha!

I bought Matthew a bath seat recently, so that it would be ready well in advance for when he's able to sit up properly and they are sharing bathtime together. When it arrived, Arthur instantly declared it to be a "poppee" and when he was having nappy-free time later, he was determined to pull it out of the packaging onto the floor, and wedge himself in it, making his pretend wee-wee and poo-poo sounds and cheerfully exclaiming, "Poppee, poppee!" I told him it was Matthew's bath seat, but he still insisted it was a "poppee" and spent the best part of an HOUR getting stuck in it and climbing back out of it, and playing with the spinning balls on the front, etc! Funny boy. Lately I have managed to convince him that it's Matthew's bath seat, and now he calls it a "bah-peep" instead of a potty and then says, "Mah-mah" so I know he understands that it's Matthew's bath seat now! Here he is the day he got it out of the packaging:

Another sweet word of Arthur's that he uses ALL the time, is "heppin" (helping). I LOVE this one! He is so eager to "help" all the time around the house, and I love it when he is vigorously yanking towels out of the tumble dryer and gasps breathlessly, "Ahh-yah, heppin!" He uses it so much now that it sometimes gets used when he's not actually helping as such. Like if he's riding his car all around the living room and he drives it up onto a pile of laundry or something, and I ask him to come down off the pile, as he struggles to get the car off the pile, he says, "Heppin!" So I wonder if he's using it for various things, like doing as he's told, as well as helping. He's such a total SWEETIE!! I love him so much! :)

Today Neil took him to the park and they climbed a big hill. Neil told him it was a hill, and when they got home, everything was a "heew"! The stairs were a "heew" and climbing onto the sofa was a "heew". He seemed so excited with his new word and he seemed to want to create a context in which to use it again and again!

Arthur is very quick at picking up dance moves. Not specifically actions to childrens' songs, but actual dancing. I have noticed this in the past but I am noticing it more and more lately. He HAS to get that from Neil. Neil was really into dancing when he was at uni. He went out dancing a lot and was good at it. COOL dancing, you know, not the foxtrot or anything like that, haha! Me on the other hand - I am just unconfident about dancing and always have been. I have rhythm but I don't think I am naturally a very good dancer. I always just feel like I look stupid and get self-conscious. Neil's dad was also an excellent dancer and just looked naturally good at it on a dance floor. My mum always said that Arthur had that dancing "thing" that Neil's dad had, even when he was a little baby! He always enjoyed being boogied to music, any type of music. Matthew doesn't seem as thrilled about that so far, so maybe they'll be different in that as well. They are so different in so many ways! Anyway, Arthur loves to dance. He dances with his feet and his hips and his arms. Neil taught him this throw-your-hands-up-in-the-air move and he does that with such enthusiasm, it's SO cute to watch! He has rhythm and can move in time to the music, but the more excited he gets about dancing, the faster he goes and the less in-time he stays, hehe! He can dance whilst watching Neil dancing in front of him, and copy Neil's actions as he does them, really accurately. I'm impressed! I never danced that well, so it's nice to see him happily dancing away with Neil. Mostly he still just bops around crazily though, and jumps and turns around and around. I love watching toddlers dance! It's so cute :)

I have a million photos (or so it seems!) of Arthur at the park, from various outings. One from when it poured with rain and he got soaked despite having his raincoat on. He wouldn't keep the hood up, but oh well. He had lots of fun! Another time I took Arthur and Matthew to the local park with swings and we sat under a tree and had a picnic. It was an attempt at making eating interesting for him, and he did actually sit down and eat some of his sandwich, and a slice of apple, getting up and dashing about now and then between bites. Matthew got REALLY cross about being out (he still hates outings of any sort unfortunately) so we had to get up and move after a short while. We walked to the swings and Arthur ran and ran and RAN on the grass, and a nice guy gave him a tennis ball at the tennis courts, all for his very own. And Matthew cried the WHOLE time. But never mind. Arthur had fun. I found it hugely stressful but oh well. I guess I should persevere!

Anyway, here are a few photos from those occasions:

One time a few weeks ago, we went to the park with two other mums from church, and their little ones. One of them was my friend Katie and her little boy, Joshua. Joshie is Arthur's favourite friend and they really get on well together. If he knows he's going to see Joshie, he spends ages saying, "Goggie, Goggie!" over and over before we meet up with them! Josh was 2 in June so he's a bit older than Arthur, but they are just the sweetest little friends! He has a new baby sister who was born 11 days before Matthew so Katie and I have a lot in common! They were round here a few days ago for the morning and when they left, Josh waved so sweetly at Arthur and said, "Buh-bye Ar-fuh!" It was soooo sweet. They cuddle each other a lot and even give the occasional kiss :)

Anyway, so they were at the park, and so was another lady with her two little boys, aged 4 and nearly 2. The 4-year-old immediately took charge and declared himself to be "the leader", and directed the three little boys to take up some sticks and follow him through the park as we walked along! He was so sweet with them and treated them gently. Arthur was ULTRA excited to be playing with other children, and even more so to be following the lead of a big boy! He is so excited by bigger boys. He just wants to be around them all the time. They all picked up a small stick each and followed the boy around, and he gave them the task of "chopping down trees" (lightly tapping at every tree they passed with their sticks, pretending to chop it down). Arthur was BESIDE himself with excitement, and I was so thankful to have my camera with me because the cuteness was almost indescribable, hehe! He alternated between gazing at the other kids in adoration/excitement, and going completely rigid and letting out this huge squeal of excitement with a wiiiide-open mouth, like he just couldn't contain it and had to keep on squealing about it, hehe! The little boys sometimes looked a bit put-off him with his loud squealing, and they were so calm and quiet in comparison! Poor Arthur, he just couldn't seem to help himself! Katie commented that Arthur is very gregarious - he seems so eager to play with other children. I should get him more social time with other kids. It'll be easier once playgroups start up again for the new term in September.

I took about 30 photos at the park that time, but there are only a few I feel comfortable posting here, as I don't want the other kids in my diary in case their mothers wouldn't like it. The ones I can post have the other kids with their backs to the camera, mostly, or just Arthur in the photo. Or they're too distant to see much detail. Here's Arthur with Joshie:

And a few photos of Arthur with the other boys, "chopping" trees - note the squeally excitement and the one where he just got so excited that he started RUNNING randomly, hehe! The other boys just looked at him like he was a bit nuts ;)

And a few of just Arthur - still excited, bless him! ;)

I can't believe it's almost time to think about an actual playgroup/nursery for him!!! I am thinking to start him at a normal pre-school playgroup when he's maybe 2 and a half. He'll start nursery in the afternoons once he's 3, but that's not for ages yet. Until he's 2 and a half I will take him to mother-and-toddler groups galore, as much as I can handle with Matthew in tow (who I REALLY hope will get more tolerant of outings and not make it so difficult that we have to keep leaving places early). I am DREADING the bugs and colds and yuck that will come with it, but that's just part of the territory when you're a toddler (or a mother of one!). It was my lovely GP who put my onto the idea of starting him at the type of playgroup where the mothers don't stay with their little ones, when he's about 2 and a half. She said to start looking around just before he turns two, in case there are waiting lists. I guess there are places he could go now where I don't stay with him, but I have no desire to take him to those yet. He's still so little, and there's really no need. He gets the same social/play/exercise/activity exposure at a mother-and-toddler group where I stay with him, as he would at a leave-him-there playgroup anyway. He is confident and never looks for me when we're at a playgroup, but for me, that isn't reason enough to test him yet. Same as at church creche (when we actually go!). I know they think I'm NUTS for sitting out the whole sermon in the creche with Arthur and one or two other babies and two helpers (it's a SMALL creche!). Every mother there is desperate to pry herself loose from her baby at only a few months old it seems, and will try endlessly for months on end, saying what a good morning it was for their little one when they only cried and had to fetch the mummy in 3 times that morning! They ask me every time if I would like to leave Arthur and go back to the service and I get some funny looks when I say no every time. Especially since Arthur is running around playing with toys, seemingly oblivious to my presence! But I am staying with him. I stick with Arthur like glue till he's 2 and a half, and even then I'll see how I feel. Maybe he'd be fine, but I don't care to test him. He's still just a baby. School is YEARS away. He doesn't need the practise yet, not for a long while. I am eager to give him plenty of "practise" at learning new things socially and activity-wise with Mumma close at hand. Whether he feels he needs me there or not, I will be there, and maybe that will help him feel more secure during this early phase, ready to be more independent when he's old enough to start trying that kind of thing.

Did I mention that he calls me "Mumma" now? I love it!!! I usually refer to myself as Mummy, but he calls me Mumma. It's not "Mama" any more, it's changed to sound slightly different now. I love the name Mumma. I almost want him to keep calling me that instead of Mummy, but then I fear that Mumma stands more chance of getting shortened to Mum than Mummy does. I hate "Mum"!! But I'm sure he'll end up calling me that - it seems like ALL kids do these days. But then, maybe I'll warm to it once he's the one calling me it. My brother and I still call my mother, "Mummy", or "Mim". I don't know where Mim came from! It's a more affectionate name for us to use for her than Mummy even, and we mostly call her Mummy. I love that we do, although I admit it didn't always feel cool while I was at school. I felt I had to try to avoid saying "Mummy" around my friends in case they laughed at me. I would say, "My mum" instead. I think I even tried calling her "Mum" once or twice and it just felt WEIRD and awkward, like I had called her by a name that was somebody else's and not hers. Anyway, I hope my little ones will call me Mummy, but I know they are probably more likely to call me Mum. But oh well.

Arthur is waking AGAIN. That's at least once per hour so far. He's moaning. I hope he's okay, poor baby. I wonder if we should give him some Calpol?

I have a load of photos of the boys together (some getting rather old now as they were taken a few weeks ago) and quite a few of Matthew, but I've run out of time. I need to check on Arthur (who is quiet again now) and get ready for bed (YIPES, it's after midnight!!!) because Matthew will probably wake for a feed soon - he's been asleep 6 hours now. I'll try to update again soon, and one day maybe catch up on all those diaries I'm missing!! Thank you for the messages again! :) Back soon!

Vaccinations tomorrow, urgh.

Back again, just for a moment! Both boys are asleep for their naps but Matthew doesn't sleep as soundly in the day as he does at night, so I don't know if this will wake him or not. I'm sorry about my guestbook - it seems to be playing up a lot lately, tsk! Not sure what to do about that, but please feel free to email or leave a note (if you're a D'lander) instead. Signmyguestbook.com have been so crap lately, but I love my guestbook so I keep hoping they pull it together and provide a half decent service again! Thanks for the emails and notes and messages after my last entry!! :)

Arthur's MMR and Matthew's Hibb booster jabs are TOMORROW afternoon. I am dreading it. Urgh.

Our oven broke. I had fish fingers in it for Arthur's tea last week and I opened the door when they were done and the door fell apart in my hands! The glass front fell out on the floor and everything, and a hot part fell on my arm but thankfully I didn't get burnt. Stoopid old crappy oven! Anyway we examined it and it really is not fixable, so yet more £ to shell out for some household item. Two weeks before, the last of our set of 4 lamps in the living room broke (just died, not the fuse or the bulb or anything) and so we had to go and buy another full set. We got cheap ones so I hope they last! Anyway, the oven is built into a fitted kitchen and so we are getting a CHEAP oven fitted in at great expense on Friday. Fortunately we don't really use the oven that much. We use the gas hob or the microwave quite a lot so we've managed okay without it.

We had a HUGE thunderstorm a few weeks ago and it was Arthur's first real experience of one. He got soooo excited at the window, yelling that there was "ray" and "nuh-nuh" (rain and thunder). We let him stand at the front door to watch, and he was so excited! Loads of spray came in and he got soaked, but it was 30 minutes before bathtime so it was okay. Neil even swung him out in it for a second so he could REALLY feel the rain! He wanted to reach out and touch it. I LOVE thunderstorms and heavy rain. They are so exciting when you're a little kid! Here are some photos - I used the flash by mistake on the 3rd one so it's come out WAY too bright, but oh well. He looked so excited in that one that I had to post it anyway :)

Ack, Matthew is awake. I guess it's not a good idea to type during the day when he's asleep then. Oh well! At least I got a few more photos and stuff posted! I'll try again later, or maybe tomorrow if the boys aren't feeling too poorly from their jabs and I have a moment to get online. Back soon!

Big catch-up (part one!) with photos :)

I'm BACK!!!! :) Yay! Well, for about 5 minutes, as this is the first real opportunity I seem to have had to update my diary for WEEKS and it'll be over when Neil and the boys get home from the park. It's raining. I hope it hasn't turned into a horrible outing for them all! Matthew hates outings, whether he's in the car, sling, pushchair, whatever. He just seems to hate it and cries, so that makes it no fun for the parent who is taking them out, and not much fun for Arthur either really. But hey ho, we persevere! Arthur has to go out, and at the moment I feel like I will go CRAZY if I don't get some time alone in the house without noise or impending responsibility, etc. Even an hour is nice, and they've been gone that long now so I think they'll be home soon.

Matthew sleeps next to where the computer is and we just can't figure out an alternative place to put it so we are not getting on the computer much at all any more :( I am seriously going crazy with how much I miss my Diaryland friends!!!! And my Fertility Friend buddies too. I want to just browwwse diaries like I used to and keep up with the lives of people I know and love here at Diaryland. I can't remember the last time I signed anyone's guestbook, but now I don't even know what's happening in anyone's lives! I hope you guys are all doing well. I promise I'll try to catch up soon. I WILL find a way to use the computer, hehe! Most of all I miss updating my diary when I feel like it, and when I have a backlog of photos or newsy stuff to write about Arthur or Matthew. Or just my thoughts. I do sometimes get online to check eBay or emails and messages and stuff, but it's the clattery typing of a 2-hour diary entry that isn't fair to Matthew while he's asleep for the night. Neil misses his horrible shoot-em-up game too. We are really trying to figure out a way to change this!

I used the last HOUR updating my blinkies - yes, I am still horribly addicted to them, hehe! I'm so sorry about the vast amount of them flashing away at your poor eyes, lol! I got rid of some old ones. I am not co-sleeping with Matthew right now, but the way things are at the moment is that Arthur still co-sleeps with Neil (while I do "night duty" with Matthew!) so I kept that blinkie. I can't find a breastfeeding milestone blinkie for Arthur's current age so the latest one (18 months) still stands. I have a TWO YEAR one all ready to use though! :) I hope we make it! I'm pretty sure we will.

Okay so now that the blinkies are all updated, I can start the mammoth task of catching up with news about the boys and life in general, and of course all the millions of photos! Fortunately for my diary, I haven't had time to take as many photos as I would normally have liked, so there aren't TOO many to post all at once! Still quite a few though!

Well! I can't believe summer is nearly over and we're into the second half of August already!!! It just went by in a flash. Neil and I celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary on August 14th :) Matthew turned two months old the same day. HOW have two months gone by since I gave birth?!?!! He is 9 and a half weeks old now. Crazy.

Arthur is 21 months old and now that autumn seems to be approaching, it's rather freaking me out because the end of autumn marks Arthur's birthday, and I seriously, SERIOUSLY cannot fathom having a two-year-old! It seems crazy to me. Two is soooo.... not a baby anymore, in any sense of the word! It's so "little boy" and grown up. I can't believe he's going to be two in a matter of a few months. BUT I feel excited and proud to be able to say that I am a mummy to a two-year-old! Though I'll miss being able to say that I have two children under the age of two. Which is a weird concept in itself to me! All these milestones are just whizzing by and being snatched from under my nose just as I'm pausing to inhale their sweet fragrance, they are just passing SO fast! I feel sad about that but then the next stage is always so exciting that I can't stay sad for long because I am too eager to embrace what comes next!

I had my 8-week postnatal check with the Health Visitor last week and it went fine. I did the Postnatal Depression Screen and scored 8, which is "nice and low" apparently. I scored 7 with Arthur, I think, about the same. So that's good. I don't feel depressed, and I'm coping better and better all the time with two demanding little ones! Though there are always going to be good days and bad days, days that flow wonderfully and make me feel like SuperMummy, and days that are just HIDEOUS and I can't imagine how I got through them. I think that is normal motherhood for you though! And I'm adjusting to that and accepting it, so that helps.

Okay, some photos! Then if I have time after that I'll write some more newsy stuff. If the boys get home, I'll maybe save this and try a little clattering-keyboard session this evening, but not for too long in case I disturb Matthew too much. He pretty much sleeps when we attempt to use the computer but he stirs more and I feel bad about invading his sleeping space anyway.

So here are some sweet photos of my lil boys with their Daddy. Matthew was 7 weeks and 4 days old when these were taken, so I guess it's been a couple of weeks (ALREADY!) since then. Neil was trying to get Matthew to smile at him - which is NOT a difficult thing these days, that boy is just like his brother and smiles and smiles and smiles at just anyone! He's such a sweetie :) In the first photo, Matthew was "talking" to Neil, another thing he likes to do a LOT! Arthur was looking a little put out in the second photo but he was actually just fiddling with something on his fingers. In any case, Neil was telling Matthew how scrummy he was and then turned to Arthur and gave him a huge hug and a kiss and told him he was lovely too :) And then Arthur wanted to kiss Matthew (he does this a LOT), so they're sweet photos :)

Arthur is still doing great with Matthew. He doesn't ever show any jealousy towards him, and the only times he even shows the tiniest bit of frustration is when he really wants to breastfeed, or for me to do something for him and I am feeding Matthew or trying to burp him or settle him if he's crying a lot. Then he will pat the bouncy chair and say, "Dair" or pat the changing mat on the floor and say, "Nat!" and then, "Ma-Ma" (his word for Matthew), which is his way of telling me he wants me to put Matthew down in the chair or on the mat so I can attend to Arthur for a while! If I can't do that right at that moment then he gets cross or whiney, but how long that lasts depends on how tired he is or what kind of mood he's in. If he's tired and cranky it can turn into a tantrum but otherwise just a moan for a few seconds before moving onto something else.

Sometimes I have to tell him to wait when I am breastfeeding Matthew and Arthur wants to join in. If I have Matthew across my body then it's too fiddly for me to latch Arthur on the other side. I CAN do it, but lately I am telling him he needs to wait a moment till Matthew is finished. It's easier for me that way and Arthur CAN wait. If I know they both want to breastfeed at the same time and I haven't started with either of them yet, then I'll set it up so that they can both nurse. I put a pile of pillows by my side and lay Matthew on those so he's in a sort of football hold under my arm, but on the pillows instead of held in my arm. Then I latch him on and Arthur has plenty of room on the other side to nurse too. My milk flows WAY more strongly when they are both nursing at the same time!

My instinct is to give priority to Matthew with breastfeeding, since I know that's all he can have and he needs all that he asks for. But if Arthur has hurt himself and wants milk then I will actually take Matthew off the breast and nurse Arthur instead, if his position means I can't shuffle him to one side a bit and make room for Arthur. It is just a case of playing it by ear really, with tandem nursing.

I am loving tandem nursing on the whole and I would definitely do it again - well, I would certainly not try to avoid it if I happened to still be breastfeeding Matthew when I am expecting another baby, but I wouldn't TRY to make it happen if Matthew was actually showing signs of weaning himself. Tandem nursing is so wonderful and so precious, but I am also finding it extremely demanding. It's one of the most challenging things for me, about being a mummy to two little ones at the moment. Arthur has been going through a normal-but-tiring phase that I had read about in my tandem nursing book, where he is pretty much refusing to eat any solid foods and the result is that SOMEHOW I am almost exclusively breastfeeding a new baby and a toddler! And believe me, a toddler has a MUCH bigger appetite than a baby! Arthur asks for milk so frequently sometimes that I seem to do nothing but breastfeed one or both of them, all day long. It's SO exhausting, and draining, and I just get so thirsty and hungry all the time. Thirsty more than hungry though. I never seem to have time to get myself enough to drink so that doesn't help.

The thing is, I know it's just a phase and I don't want to push him, as it's going to pass and pushing him could backfire big time. The book says a few weeks to a couple of months of meal-refusal is common (and nothing to worry about, since my milk is very nourishing even for an exclusively breastfed toddler, though I know he is surely going to need more after a couple of months). He will still take snacks so I make sure the snacks are fruit or cheese or cereal bars. He really likes raisins and cereal bars, and I get him the toddler ones that are fortified with iron and stuff, so that is good.

We thought maybe the meal issue was to do with him having outgrown his highchair or something, at the age he is at now, so we have ditched it (with much joy - it's a pain in the arse and we'll be buying a different type of highchair for Matthew) and bought him a Handysitt booster seat so he can sit up to the table. He LOVES the booster seat and it has meant he has been a little more open to eating SOME meals, but not totally.

Okay the boys are home. Will try to type more later.

Back again - it's 8pm and the boys have both been asleep since about 7pm. Matthew is RIGHT behind me in his cot-bed (the back of my chair is 2 inches away from the cot side!) but so far he seems to be peaceful enough and doesn't seem disturbed. I'll see how much I can get typed before he gets stirry.

So the tandem nursing - hard work. Thankfully I have plenty of milk and they both get whatever they demand of me. Sometimes I feel like they EMPTIED me as I've gone down like 2 cup sizes since they started, hehe! But then Matthew will want to feed again and somehow there's still some there because he gulps and I feel the let down. So that is a wonderful thing. I honestly think they take pints and pints and pints of milk per day from me though. It feels more work for my body than ANY of Arthur's growth spurts when he was a little baby. That's another thing, I haven't actually noticed Matthew having growth spurts by his feeding. Maybe that's a feature of tandem nursing or something? There must be perlenty of milk if two of them are nursing like they are, so maybe there's no need for him to feed around the clock to work up my milk supply? It's there already, or something? I don't ever breastfeed Arthur overnight, although if he wakes and cries for me during the evening (very rare) then I'll nurse him. Matthew wakes for feeds 2 or 3 times over the 12 hour night, and not at regular, predictable times, but perhaps an example would be 1.30am, 4am and 6am. If he has only 2 wakings or if I feed him from the same side all night because I've forgotten which side I'm on, I am really engorged by the morning. I was never engorged with Arthur at any stage, so I guess I really am making enough milk for two and when only one nurses for a longer period, the milk for the other one builds up (owch!)! But then they both get a mega feed in the morning (and AFTER Arthur eats an okay breakfast too, so it's not interfering with his appetite that time).

Anyway. I hope Arthur gets more interested in food soon. We're working on getting him exposed to a bigger variety of foods, as his "acceptable" reportoire is getting smaller and smaller. Everything new I put in front of him (and eat with him - another technique we're trying), he wrinkles up his nose at, and makes a "blech!" sound in his throat! Matthew stirs.... Nope, he's okay. I'll continue!

Arthur is REALLY at the "No!" stage of toddler-hood! He says "no" ALL the time, but not just randomly like I sort of expected. If he wakes at night and doesn't see Neil there when he expected to, he'll say, "Nooo..." in this sad little voice (immediately followed by "Mama, maamaaa!") and that's usually the first sign we hear of him waking up in the evening when it happens. If he knocks down something he was building by accident, he says the same "Nooo..." in a sad voice and then gets cross and frustrated with the bricks and bashes the whole tower down angrily. If the Teletubbies is finishing (the bit where they say bye-bye), he makes such a funny exaggerated frowning expression and says, "No!" The way he says no sometimes makes it sound like the 'o' drags on and on, but like "nawwww" rather than "nooooh". Most of the time he sounds so sweet and funny when he says it that I can't help smiling! I try to hide it though. It would be most exasperating to Arthur if he saw me smiling at his frustrated outburst all the time! ;) Of course he also uses "no" for the usual stuff, in answer to most of my questions! He shakes his head instead sometimes, but he doesn't say no to EVERYTHING, only things he doesn't want. Which is a lot of things these days!

We are no longer using the "Naughty Step" method of discipline with Arthur. It didn't seem to be working and I kept on trying and trying to find a reference ANYWHERE that might tell me if he was too young for it, which was my hunch after a while, but I couldn't find anything. We stopped it anyway but his behaviour got more difficult to handle without a method of discipline (obviously!!). We really really don't want to smack (read: spank, for US readers!) our children. It's just not something I feel comfortable with, and I really don't believe it's even necessary for disciplining a child - but that is just for ME and MY children, I absolutely do not mean to judge anybody who DOES choose to discipline their children in that way. I was smacked as a child (a LOT, I was pretty naughty, hehe!) and don't particularly hold any grudges against my parents for it, but I don't feel I want to repeat it with my own children. As a child, being smacked HURT, and felt intimidating and harsh. My parents would usually combine smacking with having lost their temper with us (quite understandably, I am realising, now that I am older and wiser!), and my memory of that method of discipline was angry faces and angry eyes and intimidating grown-ups standing over me. I LOVE the Supernanny approach which teaches that you don't need to intimidate a child to discipline them, and that you should come down to their level so that you don't intimidate them, etc, and never shout or lose your temper or get angry. I can't WAIT to learn how to do that!

My mummy and I talk a lot about discipline and it's great to be the child who was disciplined by her in that way and to now be talking to her about how it was from THEIR perspective. She told me they never wanted to smack their children but they just felt driven to it and didn't know how else to gain control over our behaviour sometimes. She said they would go through times when they would smack us and then have long talks and decide it wasn't right or that it wasn't working (as it didn't seem to be taking effect sometimes), so then they'd try to stop and end up "driven to it" again. My poor parents! I appreciate soooooo much more what they went through now that I am a parent myself, and I haven't even got to the stage where my kids are old enough to REALLY play up yet! I am so glad I am really close with my parents and can talk to them in such detail about these things. It really helps to figure things out.

Anyway, what eventually happened is that Neil and I felt more and more out of control over some of Arthur's behaviour (especially hurting us on purpose), and loss of control plus loss of temper = lashing out angrily to try and "fix" it, and the result of that has been that Arthur has been smacked a few times. The first time I smacked him, he was kicking and scratching at me (and laughing), and I warned him that if he did it again I would smack him. I did not get wound up, I just calmly warned him. He did it again immediately so I smacked him on the leg. He laughed, which I totally did not expect! I felt BAD for smacking him but this HUGE sense of relief at somehow having grabbed some control of the situation, though it didn't seem to affect him then and there. He was still behaving like that later that day and he hurt Neil the same way, and when Neil warned him and then smacked him, he cried. Then we both felt way too bad about it and said to each other that we were never doing that again. We spent time with Arthur hugging him and telling him we loved him and that it was wrong of Mummy and Daddy to hurt him back for something. Urgh. And then about a week later the same thing happened and he got smacked again :( We just felt absolutely OUT of any other options, and didn't know what else to do. We can't just let him hurt us like that. But it definitely doesn't feel like a good thing to hurt him back - what does that teach him?!

I finally bought two Supernanny books so that I could have an easy reference to some of her ideas that I definitely want to use, and I was hoping the books would tell me about the right age for using the techniques. Sure enough, he is too young for the Naughty Step technique. She recommends starting that at age two, which we will most definitely do. I love that method. It WORKS, and it's gentle and simple and doesn't intimidate the little one, or raise a parent's temper. She said that before age two, children are not able to understand the process that goes with the Naughty Step technique, and she suggested that you remove your child from the situation they are in if they misbehave. So if they hurt another child while they're doing some fun activity together, they get taken away from the fun activity and thus the message gets across much more simply for them.

So we've been using a similar approach since I read that. Arthur is quite predictable at really playing up during nappy changes, especially pooey ones. He kicks and squirms and does his best to sabotage our efforts to change him hygenically! If we ask him to stop, he laughs and does it more. If we tell him that hurts Mummy and he mustn't do it, he hurts me harder. So we now set it up to our advantage. We give him a toy or object that he loves playing with, or put something on the telly that he loves, just for the nappy-change. The moment he starts acting up, we tell him he must not do that and explain why, and then tell him that if he does it again we will take the toy away from him, or switch off the Teletubbies, etc. You can see him stopping to think about that, something he didn't seem to do much with the other methods we tried, and then if he REALLY doesn't want the Teletubbies to get switched off, say, he will usually frown at me and say, "Nooo!" So I tell him he must be a good boy and lie still for Mummy, or not kick Mummy, or whatever. This is often all I have to do, but if he does kick me again then I have the wonderful luxury of NOT getting worked up in the least, and simply telling him he does not get to watch any more Teletubbies because he kicked Mummy, and leaning over and switching it off, and there we have it! Discipline achieved!!! :) It's so simple and SUCH a relief when it happens. I feel completely in control where I NEED to be in control, and yet I don't get angry or stressed, and I don't have to hurt Arthur, and he doesn't get intimidated by me. Soooo simple! :) He cries a lot when I switch it off or take away the toy he is playing with, but I just explain again why I did it, and he has to lump it. He doesn't play up again after that, during that nappy-change. I think if he DID, I might be stuck, since I would have used my "bargaining tool" (as Neil and I call it, hehe - "I'm just going to change Arthur"..."Okay - wait, have you got a bargaining tool?" hehehe!) and then I'm not sure what else I'd use to get my point across.

Anyway that is working MUCH better for us, but there are still windows where he does something we HAVE to take a stand against and it happens to be in a situation where he doesn't care one bit about any object or entertainment around him, and thus we have nothing to implement that kind of discipline with! Sometimes in those situations we might remind him of something that's coming up later that he enjoys, like he likes playing "tents" with Daddy under the duvet cover before he goes to sleep at bedtime. Neil sometimes tells him if he doesn't stop X, Y or Z right now, he will not get to play tents at bedtime. And we have to follow through on whatever we say, which is sometimes so sad. I hate having to take things away from Arthur that he loves, but I love him enough to discipline him when he misbehaves, and it's important that I am consistent with whatever method we choose to use. I hate it MUCH less than using my hand to strike him though. Much less. So we'll continue like this until he's two and then reassess, and maybe start the Naughty Step technique then, or maybe wait a while longer. Supernanny said some children aren't ready for that till they are 2 and a half.

Anyway, what a LONG waffle about discipline! I think I'll post some more photos and change the subject!

Bedtimes are going better and better. Matthew seems very strong, physically, and his head control is really good. We decided he is ready to join Arthur and Daddy for "big boy bathtime" in the evenings!! This has been something Neil and Arthur have done since he was just a few months old. I don't think we really intended it to be a permanent thing, but it's just how it panned out. I have never bathed with Arthur since, and Arthur has only ever bathed with Daddy since then! I bathed him once a couple of weeks ago because he pooed EVERYWHERE (teething poo) and had a horrible painful rash on his poor bummy that made him cry and shake just by walking :( It got that bad out of NOWHERE, in just a couple of hours, and then we noticed the tooth. Pesky teething! Anyway so I bathed him before Neil was home from work that time, but other than that he has had every single bath with Neil since he was a little baby. So it's quite a big thing for Matthew to join in! Here is Matthew's very first "big boy" bath, with Arthur and Neil (no bubbles on that occasion due to over-paranoia about Matthew's new delicate skin!):

He did really well! I thought he'd cry but he didn't, he just seemed calm and happy to be there. He only freaked out a tiny bit when Arthur tried to wash his hair (which you can see in the photo!), but he was happy as anything otherwise! He has had quite a few baths with Arthur and Daddy since then and he seems to love them! While they are bathing, I sit by the bath and wash Matthew's hair so that Neil has hands free to hold Matthew and play with Arthur, and then I take Matthew and dress him for bed while Neil gets Arthur ready for bed. I lay down in bed with Matthew (in the spare room) and breastfeed him - the only time I ever breastfeed him BEFORE sleep. We are still following the E.A.S.Y. routine with Matthew so he gets fed when he wakes up, and it's going well. So I nurse him before bed, and if Neil has finished getting Arthur ready for bed before I'm finished with Matthew, he and Arthur play tents and read the Toddler's Bible and stuff, till I hand Matthew to him for burping and rocking. Then Neil puts Matthew to bed once he's all sleepy (he goes right to sleep, but it can take a while to get him sleepy enough), while I breastfeed Arthur in his bed. Arthur goes to sleep well, usually. Sometimes I get sore and have to stop breastfeeding him if it's just going on for EVER, and then Neil comes in and lies with him till he's asleep while I tidy the toys away downstairs. It sounds complicated but it's not, it feels easy and it really works for us. Both the boys are usually asleep for the night by 7.30pm, and they both sleep through the evening till at least our bedtime. Matthew will go till 1.30am or sometimes a bit later if nothing disturbs him before then, and Arthur usually sleeps through the night. Sometimes he wakes or stirs a lot and Neil resettles him pretty quickly.

Anyway so it's GREAT to have our evenings to ourselves! We have the air-conditioning roaring away upstairs all the time, despite the weather being a lot cooler. The house still seems too warm (21 degrees or warmer without the A/C in the bedrooms) so we keep it on. I am slightly nervous about when it's too cold to use it anymore, because the sound it makes is REALLY useful in helping the boys not be disturbed by random sounds, or by each other when they wake in the night. We watch the TV in the evenings without headphones, which is something we haven't done since Arthur was a newborn!!! He was just soooo difficult with sleep and woke at the tiniest sound, so we ended up wearing headphones in the evenings to watch TV and creeping around like mice! I'm so glad that's over with! We'll have to try and continue with normal household sounds for Matthew. I'm sure he'll be fine with it, if he's used to it. I expect they might wake a little more at first once the A/C is off, but hopefully they'll adjust quickly.

Time for more photos I think! Matthew doesn't seem bothered by my typing but I want to hurry and finish, as this entry is getting long and it's getting late too. My dinner is almost ready so I need to hurry up.

We got a WONDERFUL package from my lovely friend Lisa a few weeks ago! Lisa found me through my pregnancy diary when she was pregnant with her sweet little girl, Aeres, who is the same age as Arthur. It was SO exciting to receive a package from the States with SUCH beautiful gifts inside, some for Arthur, some for Matthew (the CUTEST outfits!) and a special one for Neil and I - a beautifully framed photo of Matthew and Arthur when Matthew was 10 days old!!! It's my very favourite photo and I had longed to get it printed and framed (which Lisa didn't know!) so it was really touching to receive such a special gift. Anyway, here are a couple of photos of Arthur while he was opening Lisa's package - he was so pleased to see the framed photo! He said (with huge pride!) "Aaah-yah!" (Arthur) when he saw himself in the picture, and gazed for ages before he said "Ma-Ma" as well :) He also insisted on trying to put the new teeny tiny shoes for Matthew on his own feet!

And here are a couple of photos of Matthew (at 7 weeks old) in one of the super cute outfits that Lisa sent:

See my sweet smiley boy?! I love that baby boy SOOOOOOOO much, I just can't tell you. He's the sweetest thing! He is starting to fill out a little more this week, and today we noticed the beginnings of little rolls at the top of his legs and arms :) I wonder if he'll be a chunky chubby boy like Arthur was? They are VERY different shapes though. The health visitor weighed Matthew a week ago and he was 11lbs 4oz - only a 5oz gain (just under) since almost 2 weeks before. It dropped him to the 25th percentile (from the 50th), and although the health visitor said it was fine, it still felt kind of strange to me because of how Arthur did the absolute opposite at the same age - jumping from the 50th to the 80th percentile and staying there for many months!

She said that it was obvious that Matthew was a very different shape to Arthur, longer and leaner, like Neil. She also reminded me that it's normal for breastfed babies to gain more slowly at first than formula fed babies, and thus it looks like they have dropped their percentile on the charts, as the charts are based on formula fed babies (how stupid?!). She said Arthur was not the "norm" for weight gain in breastfed babies! So I shouldn't worry about Matthew's weight. He is content and doesn't seem hungry in between feeds. He doesn't feed overly frequently, and he gets full enough to refuse and bring up a TON of milk at the end of each feed, so I'm sure he must be getting enough, BUT his feeds are crazy short. He finishes all he wants in 4 or 5 minutes. The health visitor thinks because of my strong let-down reflex, that he really is getting all that milk in such a short space of time, and he doesn't need to nurse for longer. But she said I should always offer him the second breast anyway, even if he refuses. I realised that I had stopped offering the second side because I guess I was pre-empting his refusal. I am happy to relax about his weight once I have tried offering him the other side for a while and his percentile stays the same. I've been doing it more since she weighed him and he mostly DOES take a little from the other side. Not much though - he seems pretty full.

Also he was weighed four hours after he was last fed, as he had just woken up from a 3-hour nap and she weighed him first and then I fed him, so that will have affected his weight a bit, she said. And he was weighed on a day where I had been unwell for 3 days (I was better by the next day though) with some weird sinusy dizzy thing that I couldn't figure out for ANYTHING, but which oddly seemed to noticably affect my milk supply. It bounced back up after I felt better though, but anyway she said that could have affected it too. She is going to weigh him on Wednesday just to see how he's doing, but she is happy with him as he is.

Wednesday is a big day for the boys. We are going to the clinic to have vaccinations done :( Matthew is having his first round of the 6-in-1 Hibb booster, and I've made a double appointment because Arthur is going to have his MMR. I am horribly nervous about it. But it just needs DOING, and then it's done. We'll be doing the playgroup scene like crazy (I expect) from September and measles is at its highest rate in 20 years in this country. I delayed the MMR for a while but always intended him to have it, so I guess it's time. I hope hope hope it's all going to be okay though. I'm sure it WILL be, but it's easy to get nervous with all the hype, you know? Anyway, fun fun Wednesday, Calpol at the ready, etc! I will be glad when it's over and done with, and I just hope they don't suffer too much with side effects.

Oh, I know what else I meant to catch up on! We have had two visits with Neil's sister and her baby girl, Ella, since Matthew was born! The first one was when Matthew was a couple of weeks old and they came to visit us. I found a few photos on my camera of Arthur entertaining Ella with a muslin cloth on the sofa (!!):

Funny boy! I love how Ella was clapping him in that last one, hehe! Anyway then we drove to see them (an hour away) a few weekends ago because Neil's mum and youngest sister were staying with them and they still hadn't met Matthew yet. It was a lovely afternoon but SUCH a total nightmare getting there and back, to the point where we had to decide not to do that kind of drive again. We have put a limit on car journeys now, based on what the boys can tolerate, which is pretty short at the moment - only 30 minutes. Any longer than that and the journey is a totally stressed out nightmare for everyone, and we end up having to stop at least twice to calm Matthew down or something, and we end up frazzled and late for the thing we were driving to, and Matthew is just exhausted and sobbing and overheated and Arthur is getting fed up too. It's just not worth it. People will have to come to us for a while. But it was nice to see everyone while we were there, and they made us a lovely lunch (which they had to keep warm in the oven for a while!) and it was great to see Ella, and to watch Neil's mum proudly holding another new grandchild.

Ella had a push-along car thingy that converted so you could ride it, and Arthur LOVED that! He rode it a lot in their garden:

Even better, they had a black rabbit called Harry, and Arthur could not get enough of trying to see Harry at ALL times, while Harry tried desperately to escape and hide all over the garden! Arthur isn't (yet) the kind of toddler who bears down on small creatures and birds aggressively at high speed, thank goodness! He just wants to see them, and stands back a bit, but if they go out of sight then he wants to find them so he can see them again. Here he is watching Harry, who is frantically disappearing at a run out of the shot, hehehe!

I love this photo of Arthur and Ella with their lovely attentive daddies! It was just a random shot of various happenings around the garden while we were all out there, but I love it because it captures how lovely Neil is at playing with Arthur and how careful and attentive Leigh is with Ella. He is such a nice guy, and such a lovely father. Ella is walking now, and she kept trying to keep up with Arthur, but he just RUNS all the time and poor Ella just kept getting left to watch him! She'll be keeping up with him in no time though, I'm sure. Anyway, the photo!

I keep forgetting that Matthew and Ella share the same birthday! How amazing that is! She's such a sweet little girl, and she smiles prettily and waves and is just generally completely adorable! It was so nice to see them.

Urgh this entry is soooooo long and it's getting so late. I need to go to bed! But I have SO much more to say and soooo many photos to post yet!

Here are a couple of photos that I love (taken when Matthew was about 4 weeks old, and not quite at the peak of his hatred of car journeys!) - Neil took the boys out for a short drive to the park to give me a break to rest one Saturday, and they both fell asleep in the car (very unusual for either of them actually!). When he got home they still hadn't woken, so he came inside and fetched me to see them, and I took a couple of photos. That's when we really realised we suddenly had a car full of boys! I mean, only TWO boys, and tiny ones at that, but the car was full! You can't fit another car seat between theirs, even in our big car. It was just full of sleeping boys :)

Okay that is all for now. I think I'll just have to save the rest for another entry, which I'll TRY to get done soon. Matthew seems to have slept fine with me typing away and hasn't stirred any more than usual, so maybe it'll be okay to try to go online more often? I still feel funny about it though. It's like I'm invading his sleeping space and it just doesn't feel right somehow. Anyway I will try to get updated and all the photos posted soon, and then hopefully not leave it so long before catching up again! Back soon I hope!

Nearly 6 weeks... sooo hard :(

Barely time to BREATHE, but had to write a quick entry. Otherwise I'll have no time and never get to update at all! Jemma, I did get your sweet pressie, thank you so much! Debs, I got your email and the lovely package, thank you! I wanted to email you both but I just honestly haven't had a moment. I have only been online this week to check on Julie - so excited about little Ava's arrival!!! Congratulations Julie! :) But I'm sorry that I haven't emailed you guys to say thank you. Debs, replying to your email is going to take a lot of thought and some time, and I can't can't can't do it right now, I'm sorry. I just can't do anything with my head at the moment. I can't do ANYTHING at the moment. But I do mean to, eventually.

Well it's been a while since I updated, though I updated my pregnancy diary more recently. Matthew is nearly 6 weeks old and I know there are going to be good days and bad days, good weeks and bad weeks, but I am REALLY struggling lately (again). I soooooooo desperately just need to spill everything here in huge detail, but I can't :( I haven't got time. It's already late in the evening and I still need to shower (seriously unhygienic of late) as Cameron's mum and his two little brothers are coming round to visit tomorrow afternoon. I need to get ready for bed and get ready everything I'll need for the night with Matthew. Before that I need to eat. I can't seem to eat at the moment. Four or five days ago I woke with a HORRIBLE stomach ache, like I had been kicked right up where my stomach is. I felt really nauseous too. I had no vomiting or diarrhoea, and I could still eat, but the nausea was really bad that day, and the stomach pain made it hard to bend over to change the boys and stuff. I hadn't been out anywhere and everyone is healthy so it's not a bug. I can't think of a food it could be either. It took 2 days for the nausea to wear off but the stomach ache is still lingering. It comes and goes now but it's less severe in general. My appetite is affected because foods just seem too rich for my tummy, like ANY foods other than bread and, well, bread. I am beginning to wonder if it's stress-related? I don't think I've ever felt quite this heavily stressed before, and so maybe that's why?

My diet is so crap. I eat toast for breakfast but no milk of course, and then lunch is hastily grabbed, sometimes not until 4pm if I simply haven't been given a second to myself till then. It's pretty much bread and cheese, as for some reason we are completely incapable of stocking the house with easy foods for me. It bugs me. But when we go shopping we can't think of anything to buy. Dinner is normal but we keep running late - our evenings have been STARTING at 9.30pm as Matthew has been crying a lot till then recently. Then my tummy has restricted what I can eat for evening meals, to really bland stuff. Tonight I attempted to eat lasagne and had to stop after the third mouthful, feeling sick and tummyachy. Now it's 10.45pm and I'm nibbling a bowl of granola cereal with raisins - no milk, of course. I have had zero fruit or veg today. I seem to be RAGINGLY thirsty all the time and still have a "furry" mouth after a glass of water, but I can't get enough time to drink enough anyway. I know how important it is to get a good diet with all the breastfeeding I'm doing (never mind for my own strength to recover properly from pregnancy and birth, and to fuel me for the challenging days and nights), but I just can't do it. I am too demanded of ALL the time and I can't even manage to force the time to eat. Sometimes those boys have to cry and cry while I drink water or shovel something down when I get desperate enough, and sometimes (rarely) I do get a nice little window for eating a quick meal, but mostly I just have to wait or do without.

I'm just finding things very difficult right now (again). Matthew is so hard to settle and cries a lot. I am SO exhausted it's just not funny. I am CRAZY to be on the computer right now instead of grabbing every spare second to sleep, but I just feel desperate to get all this "out there" and maybe get some advice or love or prayers or something. Most of the day, the room just SWINGS about, I am so so so tired and physically exhausted. Today when I had a millisecond to focus on just Arthur because Matthew was down to sleep at last, I felt too tired to make my face smile. It felt really odd and detached to sit with him while he played, respond to him when he talked to me, but just not have any expressions on my face or smiles for him or anything. The flesh on my face just felt too heavy and the muscles too tired to move.

Arthur is being odd, well, maybe just normal given his age and stuff? He is testing us more than ever before and finds it funny to kick us and scrunch us hard with his fingers when we're changing his nappy, etc. He continues doing things with obvious intent when we ask him not to, and any discipline we try doesn't appear to be having any effect. He screeches and shouts ALL the time and it scares Matthew (who appears to be emerging as an anxious little person more and more all the time) and drives me CRAZY like fingernails on a blackboard. If I ask him not to do it in any variety of ways that I can think of, he does it more and you can see he's enjoying the fact that he's defying me. To protect Matthew a bit, I end up taking him upstairs and lately Arthur is spending more and more time on his own downstairs without me while I do something or other with Matthew. I keep hurting Arthur when I'm angry with him and I can't seem to control myself. I am TRYING not to let myself get that way, but something just goes buzz in my head and I lose control and push him or scrunch his hand or something NASTY and unforgiveable and shameful :( If he is reaching to smack me again after I told him NO and that it hurts Mummy, and I'm breastfeeding Matthew so I can't leap up and do some active discipline that very instant, the buzz in my head happens as he reaches to smack me and I just catch his hand and crush it in mine. Today that happened again where Matthew looked likely to get caught by his hand (not purposely on Arthur's part though - he was aiming for me I think), and I caught myself in time to not crush his hand. I made my mind shout NO in my head and that stopped me squishing his hand, but while I was working on that in my head, I pushed him away from me HARD and he fell down. I didn't even seem to be the one doing it, even though obviously I was. He just pushes me right to the edge of my sanity and then beyond it, and I can't seem to get a hold of myself and behave like a nice adult person. I am so ashamed. But at the same time I keep thinking, why won't Arthur give me a break when I am this close to the edge? I know it's just the way little ones tend to be, and I should STILL be the one to take a deep breath and go easy on him, but it's so incredibly hard right now.

It just doesn't appear to be possible at ALL for one person to adequately meet the needs of two children under two. I'm serious. I have really been thinking about it carefully. Anyone I know who is coping okay with two small children seems to have at least a few hours in the week with only their youngest child, as the older one is in nursery, or even just a few hours a week in a playgroup or something. Is it even possible at ALL to manage to cope with meeting the needs of both children and yourself when both children are in the house with you, under your own care (with no other help), Monday to Friday, with no time out for the older child? Has ANYONE done this and survived?! I don't want Arthur to go to a nursery or playgroup without me just yet so that isn't an option for now. But is it possible at all for me to meet his needs as well as Matthew's and a few of my own without falling apart in the process?

If I somehow go all out and miraculously meet each of their needs vaguely adequately in a day, then I am just crying by the end of it (and halfway through it too) because of how completely depleted my OWN needs are. I find that I don't get to wee, drink much or eat at all if I manage to give the boys nearly-ish enough of me. I KNOW I can't meet 100% of their needs any more, and I have to accept that, but I still have to meet each of their needs ADEQUATELY each day, and it seems that I can't even do that for one of them without the other one actually being neglected in the process. Or me. It feels hopeless a lot of the time, although a day that goes smoothly will have me feeling happy and normal and like it's all going to be okay and I can do it. In the last week I have phoned Neil at work again in tears a couple of times. One of the times he could barely hear me for ME crying, and both boys screaming in the background, and I said I was afraid I would hurt one of them and he came home from work again. I feel ashamed to keep bothering him at work and I don't want him to have extra stress on his plate, or to have issues with work if he's coming home to rescue his children from his wife, but I just reach a point where I don't know what else to do or who else to turn to. I have nobody else than Neil.

I'm scared of the possibility of postnatal depression, because of my history of depression and because I just don't want that label (or the illness, more importantly!). I also don't want to go on any anti-depressants EVER again. I just don't. I know there's nothing wrong with doing so, and there's no stigma, etc, but I just don't want to. I have already been on anti-depressants and I don't want to do it again. I just want it to be a bad patch and it will all get better in a few weeks (am I being naiive?) and I'll remember it fondly in the future even! I phoned the church office and put all this on the prayer chain, so that was a weight off, and at least I know that some people at church will know what's going on for me at the moment and that I'm struggling, instead of probably thinking how rosy and sweet it must be for us to have our sweet 6-week-old baby and our lovely 20-month-old son and be settling into family life nicely.

At the weekend, any time Neil was holding Matthew and playing with Arthur, or taking them both out, or if Matthew was sleeping or something, I started to read "Secrets of The Baby Whisperer" which has been on my bookshelf since before I had Arthur. Neil and I decided we needed to have an idea of a good "structure to the day" to introduce for Matthew, so that he would have some obvious points to the day, a clear start and finish, and things like that. We are such highly disorganised people that we actually need to be told how to make a day look organised for our children, haha! We figured if we could show him a bit of routine to his day, it might make him feel more secure knowing what was to come, and it would be easier if he knew it from birth than if we tried to implement it months down the line in desperation or something (like with Arthur!).

I had briefly picked up that book when Arthur was tiny, but got all offended about the anti-co-sleepingness and put it away again quickly. This time I am reading it with a more open mind, and I have learned a lot already about personality types in babies and the kind of things that soothe and settle them. There is a lot about routine in there, but to my relief, nothing about "schedules" for babies. After reading some of the book, we decided to start Matthew on the E.A.S.Y. plan in the book (Eat, Activity, Sleep, and time for You while the baby sleeps, although for me this is more EAST than EASY - Eat, Activity, Sleep, and time for my Toddler rather than me!). It's a loose and flexible 2.5 to 3 hour-ish cycle that gets the little one to expect what comes next and thus to be more settled. Also there's a big emphasis on learning your baby's body language and cries. I NEVER knew Arthur's different cries. I remember the Health Visitor saying one time, "I expect you know what his different cries mean by now" and I felt utterly shocked and stumped by that, because I had no clue that he even HAD different cries! I couldn't tell what he meant at all, he just CRIED. I felt awful that I didn't know when I "should" have by then. I never did know either. I answered every cry with the breast, which I was happy to do, and I am this time too, except that the book tells me that sometimes he isn't going to be crying for milk. I want to learn what he's telling me, because if he's asking me to change him or telling me he's too hot, I don't want to be putting him on the breast as it doesn't answer his pleas at all! I want to be able to tell what he's saying so I can respond the right way every time. That will help him be more settled too. Especially the times he tells me he's tired - then I can put him to bed before he gets overtired or overstimulated and has a huge meltdown (which seems to happen constantly these days).

So yesterday we started Matthew on the E.A.S.Y. plan. After he got up, I fed him, and then his activity was cooing and smiling and getting his nappy changed and so on, but only for about 20 or 30 minutes. I am starting to observe him really carefully to try and learn his body language and what he means by it. He started to turn his head away from faces, and get fussy. I took him right up to his cot and lay him down on his tummy, and whomped on his bum for a little while. He INSTANTLY closed his eyes and went to sleep! He slept an hour, and then I fed him and he looked at bright toys for a while and went on the playmat while Arthur was in the highchair. When he seemed stressed by that, I tried something else and he just cried, so I wondered if he might be tired again already. I took him up to his cot, lay him on his tummy and patted his bottom, and once again - INSTANT sleep! He slept 3 and a half hours!!!! I know that's too long for a daytime sleep but oh well. He went out in the afternoon after his feed to the supermarket with Neil and Arthur, and when they got back, Neil handed Matthew to me from the car and said he was tired, and I walked up the stairs with him, lay him in his cot, patted his little bum and he was out like a light AGAIN!! It worked PERFECTLY yesterday. He didn't have any stressed-out crying sessions and was in his cot asleep at 6.30pm. He slept till nearly midnight and then I was in bed so I just changed him and fed him, put him down on his back in the cot awake but sleepy (in a dark room mind you) and he went back to sleep! Wonderful. He seems to really benefit from the routine and especially me responding to his cues for sleep the moment he gives them.

But today hasn't worked the same. He gave me the cues but then wouldn't settle to sleep, and cried and cried, and I ended up having to take ages upstairs with him while Arthur was alone downstairs. If he slept it was fitful and I kept having to leave Arthur again in the middle of breastfeeding him or playing Duplo after he'd been without my company already for ages, to go back upstairs and try to resettle Matthew. Sometimes I had to bring him downstairs as it was taking too long and I couldn't stay away from Arthur any longer, but that meant he was crying and overstimulated and so on. Arthur was ready for his nap and Matthew woke while I was nursing him in bed, and I had to leave him to try and resettle Matthew, who wouldn't settle, and Arthur was so tired that he just lay in his bed and cried for me :( I ended up running back and forth from one bedroom to the other, unable to anything for either of them, and just went and phoned Neil at work with the two of them SCREAMING upstairs in their beds :( In the end (Neil's suggestion) I lay in Arthur's bed with him, with Matthew on my chest, and they both eventually fell asleep that way. I put Matthew in his cot after 15 minutes and he slept four and a half hours! Again, way too long for a daytime sleep but I don't care. It's so hard when they're both up at once that I couldn't bring myself to wake him. I'd rather pay the consequences at night when there's only one to look after. He was unsettled this afternoon and Arthur was difficult, and I was utterly exhausted and it was just so hard. But they were both asleep by 8pm for the night. It's now 11.35pm (quick entry, yeah right!) and Matthew is still asleep but stirring now, so he'll be awake for a feed soon. It's weird not feeding him before he sleeps any more in the day, but it's lovely to feed him immediately that he wakes and then to have him go to sleep tired from an activity, as it will help him learn to fall asleep by himself. Yesterday it was SO weird to put my 5-week-old baby down and pat him for 30 seconds and watch him fall asleep almost by himself, and then walk across the hall and breastfeed my 20-month-old to sleep, hehe!

I think the rest of this week MIGHT be easier to deal with, despite the heat. We're having quite a heatwave this summer. It's in the high 80s or low 90s all the time, and that is ODD for a town where the average summer temperature is something like 73, let me tell you! It's very humid with it and it keeps storming every now and then. Last week there was a new national record for July in England, as the temperature reached 97F (36.5F)!! Anyway, it's hot. I hate hot because, well, I just hate it, and also because we are stuck in the house all day, all week, with the curtains closed half the day due to the heat. It's too hot to take the little ones out at all. The Health Visitor gave me a leaflet about looking after little ones during a heatwave and everything! I am SO thankful for our new air conditioner. If we didn't have it before, we would definitely have bought one when we saw the forecast for last week! It has been absolutely invaluable. It's still in the main bedroom but it cools so efficiently that the other bedroom is usually 24C in the day and 22C at night, and downstairs is 28C in the day (82F) so that's not bad, especially compared with how it was before we got the unit.

Anyway so we are managing to stay cool but the weather is getting VERY boring as I can't go out with the little ones and Arthur really needs the outings. But this week we have a few things planned, so we'll have to go out a bit. Tomorrow Cam's family are coming to visit, and then the next day I have my 6 week postnatal check (can you believe Matthew is 6 weeks old this week?!) if Neil is able to take part of the morning off to watch the boys while I go, and then in the afternoon Matthew has his newborn hearing screen at the hospital (apparently a new routine thing in this area now, which wasn't there when I had Arthur). So the week might get easier with things to break the days up a bit and stuff to distract Arthur.

Urgh, it's sooooo late and I'm so stupid to NOT be sleeping right now. I still need to shower, but what if Matthew wakes while I shower? Hmmm. Nearly finished my nibbly bowl of cereal. I MISS milk! Other types of milk don't remotely appeal to me, unfortunately. When Matthew is more settled I am definitely going to try the milk again, but not while he's still having random fussy moments, as I want to be sure it's milk and not something else.

Okay I feel a bit better for writing everything, which is a relief! I have a bazillion photos but I'll have to try to catch up with those another time. Matthew is 6 weeks old in 2 days and when we're both "signed off" by the doctor (hopefully me on Wednesday and Matthew next Wednesday at the baby clinic) then I'll put my pregnancy diary to rest again and do all my updating and photos in this diary. I'm sorry not to respond to emails and messages at the moment, or to sign guestbooks and keep up with diaries. I am reading bits here and there if I get the chance, but I just have no time for anything sanity-saving at the moment! Thank you all for the messages lately though! I can thank people here at least, and that's a start! I'll try to update again soon, and hopefully things will get easier soon too.

Matthew is here! MEGA photo entry and Arthur update :)

Oh my gosh, a whole MONTH since my last entry!!! Well, I have been keeping up with my pregnancy diary, but still, I can't bear to see this diary neglected a moment longer! I also have WAY too many photos of Arthur to wait any longer to post them!

Well, obviously, since my last entry I have had a baby!! :) Yay! Matthew Gerrard was born at home (yay for my homebirth!!) on Wednesday 14th June at 10.45pm. He was born so fast that the midwife wasn't here and Neil delivered him! My mum and dad were with us too, and I had no pain relief (but oh my GOSH did it hurt!!). Everything went fine, except for my 2nd degree tear (ow), but my stitches are fine and it's not so bad. Matthew weighed 7lbs 11oz and measured 49cm long - smaller than Arthur was, which was quite a surprise! He was born at exactly 41 weeks gestation, and that last week was the LONGEST week ever! Everything is written in a ton more detail in my pregnancy diary (link on the left there) and my birth story is in one of my entries too, but I'll get it sorted into its own link on the left at my pregnancy diary soon.

I posted this photo in my pregnancy diary, but I love it SO much and it seems fitting to post it here as part of the entry that introduces Matthew to the world of "Arthur's Mummy"! In fact I love it so much that I think maybe I'll change the photo at the top of my diary soon, and maybe use this one? Or take another one similar to it, when Matthew is a little older and more expressive :) Anyway, I am SO proud to post this beautiful photo of my boys (my BOYS, yay, I have BOYS!!) here at this diary for the first time:

I am SO thrilled to be a Mummy of TWO children now, and two such precious little boys at that. I love them both soooo much! I will be continuing to write here as normal pretty soon, about life with the two little ones. I plan to continue to update my pregnancy journal till 6 weeks postpartum, since that's when Matthew is officially no longer a newborn, and I am officially signed off by the doctor, out of my postnatal period. Already I miss pregnancy and the wonderful joy of growing a new life inside me, and the excitement of waiting to meet this new little person! I can't wait to do it all again one day. I will feel sad to close my pregnancy diary again, like I did when I closed it after Arthur, but it's only until next time :)

Okay, it's late and Matthew has been asleep for HOURS so I know he'll wake soon and then I won't be able to finish this. So I'll just post what I can.

Arthur is doing great! He loves his new baby brother soooo much! We have no jealousy issues at all so far, though I know it's still early days. I tandem nurse, sometimes they feed together, but more often I feed Matthew when he's hungry and Arthur when he wants milk or for bedtime/nap. Usually that means they don't feed at the same time, and I feel like I literally NEVER put my breasts away all day long, lol! But it's worth it :) I have a ton of milk. The leaking is getting annoying, and I am bigger than last time so my bras don't fit generously enough to allow room for breastpads. Plus we are having a hideous heatwave and thus NO bra is much comfier than anything else. So I am doing a lot of pouring milk all over the floor, sofas, children (!), etc. Every time Matthew cries or even when I lean over him to just LOOK at him while he's sleeping, milk just goes pitter pat on the floor. I should wear a bra ;) But it's too hot for clothes.

When Matthew was weighed at 13 days old (8lbs 8.5oz and 52cm long!), I asked the health visitor to weigh Arthur too! He hasn't been weighed in AGES, so I was eager to see how he's growing. He sat nice and still on the scales, and he weighed 26lbs 12oz, at 19 and a half months. That puts him at the 70th percentile so he is doing great! I stood him against the fridge and got him to stand straight and tall with his heels right back against the fridge (I can't believe my baby boy is big enough now that I can measure his height in such a "big boy" way!), and he is 32.5 inches tall, so 2ft 8.5 inches. He is growing wonderfully. My mum said at the age of 2, I was 2ft 8in, and at 2 and a half, my brother was 2ft 10.5in, so Arthur is quite tall for our family really. Neil is average height so I guess Arthur will be at least his height when he is fully grown. He seems to have had a growth spurt recently. At first we thought we were just having that syndrome of having just had a new teeny tiny baby, and thus our toddler suddenly looks as big as an ADULT, hehe! But nope, he really has grown. He was a size 4 in shoes a month or so ago when I had him fitted for summer sandals. Neil said that lately he can't get Arthur's shoes on that well, so yesterday they went shoe shopping, and Arthur is now wearing a size 5 and a half!!!! He is getting so big!

Here are some photos - I have so many to post that I'll just get started and hope to post them all before Matthew wakes for some Mummy milk!

First of all, there are lots from before Matthew was born, which I meant to update with before the birth, but oh well. Here they are now! Here's Arthur, reading his Mr. Men books :) He LOVES those books - Neil's brother bought him the full box set for his birthday, for when he was older, but he loves them now. He just likes opening the pages and pretending to read them :) And he likes to sort them into piles and put them back in the box in order, etc. Anyway, here he is doing one of his favourite activities (Mr. Funny does not appear to be very funny, haha!):

My mum came over when I reached 39 weeks, and turned up every single morning till Matthew was born, staying all day till Arthur went up for his bath and bedtime (6.30pm) to help me with Arthur. She was so wonderful! Arthur got on SO well with her, and was confident with her right from the start. He happily went out for hour-long walks with her without looking back to see me, which was wonderful. I was so tired during those last couple of weeks of pregnancy, I really don't know how I would have managed without Mummy's help. Arthur is so busy and energetic, and has to be doing some stimulating activity ALL the time when he's in the house. The second one activity ends or he gets bored of it, he is asking for the next activity. He is particularly eager to do drawing and playdough and water play these days. One follows the other instantly, but we always tidy the previous activity away first, and he's so keen on tidying that he always helps put everything away perfectly, which really helps! But anyway, Mummy was very eager to play with Arthur and just be with him and have fun teaching him new things and seeing his enthusiasm, so she was GREAT with activities for him and stuff.

Here are a few photos of them during those weeks. First, drawing - Arthur showing Mummy each pencil and crayon ONE BY ONE, hehe! He likes to show people his things in GREAT detail if they have never seen them before :)

Banging on my birth ball - he loved this! :)

Water play - don't know where Mummy was in these photos! She seemed to spend all her time constantly baling out the mat he was sitting on, hehe! Nearly the whole tubful of water ended up on the mat, but the weather was so hot that it was lovely that he was able to cool down with some water. And we never got any on the carpet either! Arthur loves filling containers with water from other containers, and ladling water into things, etc. His aim was pretty awful the first time he had water play that week, but after a few sessions, he was very accurate at pouring a cupful of water into a jug, say. He loves water play, and asks for it a lot, pointing at the kitchen sink and shouting, "Yah-yah, yah-yah!!" (his pronounciation of "water"!):

It was so hot that I made ice lollies out of a carton of freshly squeezed orange and mango juice and some cheap lolly moulds! Arthur loved those :)

He especially loves Grandy (my daddy), but he didn't get to see him much because Grandy was visiting my grandparents a lot while Mummy was helping me, and also he returned to France for a week during the middle of Mummy's stay. But when he did come round, Arthur just smiled and smiled at him all the time. He wanted to take his favourite books to him and have Grandy read them to him - a real sign of affection for Arthur! Here they are doing just that:

What else? Oh here are some photos of me, Mummy and Arthur making ginger snap cookies! It was one of those crazy things I HAD to do for my own sanity in the last few days of my pregnancy, lol! In fact I swear I NEEDED to make those cookies in order to actually GO into labour! It was such an overwhelming urge. Anyway, once I had made the dough, we cleaned the playmat and disinfected it (!!) and then Arthur helped cut out the cookie shapes with his (previously thoroughly washed!) playdough cutters! He got really stuck in and enjoyed it a lot. He loved eating them once they were done, and telling me what the shapes were with great excitement, like he does with the playdough shapes he cuts out :)

Man, I was SO hugely pregnant in those photos!!! I forget already how big I was. It's so hot at the moment, I am soooo glad not to be hugely pregnant any more during this heat! I am worried about Matthew though. He is in his cot-bed wearing only a nappy (no wrap, to let his skin breathe even better), and the fan is on in here too, but I bought a digital thermometer to be nice and sure of the temperature where he sleeps, and right now it says 28.9 degrees (84 degrees) - waaaay too hot for a safe room temperature for a newborn :( But I can't get the room any cooler. At the moment the temperature just seems to be climbing in here. Urgh. Arthur woke twice already this evening absolutely soaked with sweat, poor love. He is in just a nappy too, and the fan is on him, but it's just so muggy and horrible and oppressive, and it makes me want to say (for the MILLIONTH time in my diaries, hehe!) how much I HATE the summer with its horrible oppressive heat!!! Urgh! Roll on cooler weather, already. The next 3 days are forecast 90 degrees. Yuck. How I wish we had air conditioning!!! Fans do very little when it gets that hot with the mugginess thrown in, and I get worried about my tiny boy's safety :( Plus it's just horrid and uncomfy for all of us. Bleurgh. Hate hot weather!

Anyway! I have yet more photos! The last ever photos of me breastfeeding Arthur before Matthew was born:

And the first photos of me tandem nursing my lovely boys when Matthew was 3 days old :) I posted these in my pregnancy diary, but here they are again - I am so proud!! :)

Same dress in both sets of photos! But then, I officially have NO clothes that fit me, tsk! I seem to have gained more weight than I even expected to, and I am a clothes size BIGGER than the size I had prepared for (which was 2 sizes bigger than my pre-pregnancy size in the first place!). So, of course, I have ZERO clothes in that size. And thus nothing that fits over my vast bottom! I am eBaying as we speak ;) So that maternity dress is getting a lot of wear, as it doesn't have to negotiate with my bottom, hehe!

Here are a couple of photos of Arthur being a bit of a monkey! Climbing onto the pushchair that was temporarily stacked in the living room to make way for a new washing machine in the car! And then one that Neil took when he discovered Arthur eating a chocolate biscuit - no idea where he had managed to find it from!

His hair got so long and wild, hehe! He had a haircut just after Matthew was born though - Neil took him. That was his third haircut already!! Wow. His hair seems to grow so fast. It is also very thick when it gets long, and it was giving him itchy heat rash on his scalp in the hot weather, so we knew it was time to get it cut.

One of Arthur's favourite things at the moment is to sit in the driver's seat in the car and fiddle with all the dials and buttons! He likes to "drive" with the wheel and puts the radio on and bops while he drives, hehe! It's the sweetest thing! He likes turning the lights on and that makes a bing-bing-bing alarm with the door open, which he really likes to have "control" over by switching the lights on and off! He cries like the world is ending when it's time for him to come inside, even if Neil has patiently sat with him for TWENTY minutes while he plays there! Here he is enjoying being the "driver"! :)

Wow, I think I am nearly there on the photos at last!! Hehe! I told you there were lots of photos to post!

Urgh, 29 darn degrees in here.

Okay, Arthur just woke again and then Matthew did, so it's after midnight now. I think Arthur's asleep again - Neil is lying with him. Matthew has been fed and changed and is now lying in his cot-bed behind me wearing just a fuzzi bunz nappy. He is a very contented baby. He isn't asleep but I know he'll let me know if he gets fed up in a minute, and I'll give him some more Mummy-milk. Sometimes he takes himself right off to sleep after I put him down! I HOPE this is something he'll continue to do - I am still holding out for a baby who naturally sleeps wonderfully!

Anyway I am so near the end of this entry that I just wanted to finish it off and post it. I just wanted to say about Arthur and the new things he's saying and doing, to keep track before it all changes again!

He is so active when he's out in a big space or at the playground. He enjoys the swings and the climbing frames and slides, but mostly he loves to just run, run, RUN until he's out of breath in a large grassy area, and then pause for a moment to catch his breath, and then run and run again! It's so sweet to watch him do that funny bobbly toddler run! He is very stable running now, but it's still such a sweet little toddler's run :) He also kicks a ball really well. He runs and kicks at the same time, "dribbling" the ball with pretty good accuracy. He really enjoys that.

He is getting taller. He can reach new things that aren't really toddler-proofed enough! He can reach dishes on the kitchen surfaces, and he takes them down to put them in the dishwasher! He's the tidiest toddler I ever met! He tries to wipe Matthew's bottom with a clean cloth wipe during nappy changes, bless him! He points at pen marks on his hands or places they shouldn't be, and says, "Oh-dee..." (oh dear) which sometimes comes out like, "Oh-doh" for some reason! Anyway it's sweet because he says it in such a doleful tone, like there's a real serious problem here, hehe! He says oh-dee" a LOT these days. Anything out of place or untidy or marked or even slightly broken gets pointed at and he gets very concerned over it, saying "Oh dee" over and over till we notice and reassure him over it! He's so funny.

He says such a lot of words and things. He names EVERYTHING, though plenty of it still with his own special pronounciations! He has a book with lift out pictures, like a jigsaw, and he takes each piece out and makes a big pile of them, and then holds them out to me one by one and tells me what they are, before putting them back in their places in the book. The pictures are: drink, toast, egg, swings, dog, tree, apple, carrot, cake, duck, soap, boat, car, ball, bricks, teddy, bed and moon! He names them all and I can understand him when he names them, though his way of pronouncing some of them is very sweet and toddler-ish! I particularly like soap (boap)! He just names everything he sees, constantly. He attempts longer words like ambulance, but only Mummy and Daddy know that he is saying ambulance when he hears a siren outside and says, "Woo-woo-woo! Ahh-dan!" Ahh-dan is ambulance :)

He is SERIOUSLY into anything vehicular! He has a real obsession with seeing cars and buses and trains and vans and trucks and lorries, and you name it, if it's a vehicle, he'll love it! He also loves toy vehicles and is gaining quite a collection as I am too soppy and can't resist picking one up every time I am in the supermarket! He plays with them such a lot and gets so much obvious enjoyment out of it. He pushes them around the floor all the time. He has a set of emergency vehicles which he pushes around singing, "Ni-nny, ni-nny, ni-nny!" in a cheerful manner! Neil taught him that sirens go, "Nee-nar, nee-nar, nee-nar" - well, they USED to around here. Now they just go "woo-woo-woo!" like in the States. But I remember when they all used to go nee-nar. Anyway, I love Arthur's way of saying "nee-nar", it's so sweet to hear him cheerfully singing, "ni-nny, ni-nny!" as he pushes the ambulance or police car around the carpet, bless him!

I keep feeling amazed at the things Arthur can say and do. Toddlers just learn in leaps and bounds, don't they?! It just amazes me. They are like little sponges. Mummy told me once that you should never expect too little of a child, just because they are very young. I read somewhere that "you can start teaching your child their colours between age 2 and 3". Mummy said that's what she was told as well, but she saw my interest in things and thought why should she just expect me not to be able to learn that at a younger age? So she told me what colour things were, just as part of the normal chatting she would do while we played and things. And as a result, I knew all my colours by age two, including weird ones like mauve and beige. My first day at nursery school (a year later), they had an "orange corner" and were just learning their first colours!

So lately I have been telling Arthur what colour his crayons are as he is drawing with them, etc. I am absolutely amazed that Arthur now knows ELEVEN colours. He picks up his marker pens out of the box, holds them out to me, and names the colour before placing them in a neat pile on the mat by his paper. When he has told me all the colours and all the pens are out on the mat, then he starts drawing :)

Since teaching him colours, he has developed a HUGE fascination with colours. Everywhere he goes, he is naming colours! When we sort the laundry now, instead of naming whose item of clothing this is, or what item of clothing (trousers, etc) - which he has been enjoying doing for a while - he now wants to tell me the colour of each item. Neil says when they go out for walks, he tells Neil the colour of EVERYTHING he sees! He is really excited by colours at the moment, and for the most part, he pronounces them really well.

He knows blue (boo), purple (bur-poo), red (rrrreh), green (geem), yellow (lellow), orange (ah-gah), brown (baum), black (dat-dat-dat! He loves the sound of staccato words and for some reason as to repeat this one several times for effect, lol!), pink (pim), white (way) and aqua (ak-ah!). His favourite colour is purple, and it's the first one he became really consistent with. Then followed blue, then aqua and brown and black. At first, if I asked him what colour something was, EVERYTHING was booo (blue), and sometimes everything is lellow, but if I ask him if a green item is yellow, he shakes his head and says geem. He likes to tell me the colours of the Mr. Men on the front covers of his Mr. Men books, and he is starting to tell me more detailed stuff like the Mr. Man in question is lellow, and then he'll say, "Hat!" with his hands on his head to get his point across, and then say, "Geem" because that Mr. Man happens to be wearing a green hat. Or "sshhooo, baum" because he's wearing brown shoes. He just LOVES his colours! Today I told him my trousers were grey and my bra was beige. I figured, why not? My mum did it with me and there was nothing wrong with it. A child can learn anything you teach them, and it's not pushing him to teach him something he's interested in learning. He pointed to an olive green Mr. Man today and said, "lellow", and I realised he was ready for me to teach him more "complicated" colours like beige and stuff. He can see the difference between colours, so why not tell him what they are? He seems perfectly able to retain lots of different names for colours and use them appropriately, so I am happy to tell him more of them. Anyway, he was very eager to repeat that my trousers were "gay" and my bra was "babe", hehe! I think he will remember those colours and point them out on other items in no time. It's so much fun teaching an enthusiastic little one and watching him enjoy his new knowledge! :)

Okay I'm sure there was more I wanted to say about Arthur's latest things, but it's soooo late now and I must go to bed. Matthew got cranky just now so I nursed him to sleep in bed. I'll put him back in the cot-bed I think, when I go to bed. If he wakes he can stay in with me. It's so hot, I am hoping he'll be happy (and cool enough) in his cot-bed because I'm too hot for close snuggles tonight! I have the fan on him. I hope that's okay for a newborn, but it's so warm in here that I don't know what else to do to keep him cool enough. Okay I am going to drink a ton of water and go to bed. I will leave you with one last photo of Arthur, just being lovely and Arthur-ish :) I'll update again if I get time, hopefully soon. Arthur is changing so much, so fast. I don't want to miss recording it all as it happens, or else it just gets forgotten and I cherish it all so much that I want it recorded! So I'll try to update again soon.