Hey everyone! Okay, opening second tab so I can properly respond to people...
Re: Birth Plan--after reading some more of yours, I realized that I did want two things to happen, and told my OB that this was key. 1) that the cord stop pulsing before they cut it so he could get as much of my antibodies as possible, seeing as I wasn't BF, and 2) I get to hold him immediately, skin to skin. Well, neither happened because of the c/s. And while I'm okay with the skin to skin part, the cord thing really bugged me. But, what can you do? He seems to be a healthy little bugger anyway.
Angel--I love your Advent gifts! How wonderful! Maybe I should do that for my mum in the following year. She's been so wonderful since J was born that I'd like to do such a beautiful thing. We have still to bring out the Advent wreath and candles. Have I already missed the first Sunday? We usually do miss the first Sunday. Do you celebrate the 6th of December? I might do that with J, but won't scare him with the coal part. I think there is a similar Dutch tradition (OH's family is Dutch).
Talking about Dutch Christmas traditions, have you read David Sedaris' "Six to Eight Black Men"? I found a link to it: https://www.esquire.com/features/ESQ1202-DEC_SEDARIS
Read it, I beg of you. You will laugh so, so, so hard.
Storm--Oh, if I could, I would send you off on a tropical vacation, with a nanny for L. I can totally understand why she wouldn't like her milk; classic case of conditioning (I took first year psychology at University, so I am an expert on these sorts of things). Anyway, I send you cyber hugs:
I'm also wondering if the milk is causing her chest and nose to phlegm up. When J was badly congested, we would feed him in the bathroom with the shower on hot, so the steam would allow him to get his milk down. Otherwise, the milk would make his chest and nose too mucous-y. After that, when he got a bit better, we always gave him saline solution before his milk to clear things up.
Re: Daycare Food--the reason I ask is because your LOs seem to receiving such elaborate fare. And I was wondering what form it came in because it sounded like it was completely solid. Now I understand better. Storm--the creche has it's own cook? Now
I want to be taken care of there.
SK--how's your cold? As I said to Angel, I HATE sore throats because mine are always so horrible--just as you said, like razor blades--but I noticed that Neo-Citran for sore throats and congestion actually worked on my throat. So I looked at the ingredients, and found that the only thing in there for the throat was acetaminophen! So, I started simply taking Tylenol, and it worked. Plus, gargling with salt water. Works a treat! (I've given up not writing "British." I'm reading it every day in your posts, and watch and read British stuff all the time that your idioms are the first to pop into my mind when I'm trying to express myself these days. So, I surrender. But if I use language from the Enid Blyton Mallory Towers and St. Clair series, do not mock me. My British roots run deep and long...)
Oh, and that's wonderful about F and his sitting up and reaching for things! I found that I had no more need for the gym mat (which was sad, but freed up a lot of room) after J learned to sit up, and had to look around for toys for sitter-uppers.
Borboleta--I have no idea how domestic J will turn out to be (as we certainly are not), but I will have one rule. When he turns 14, he will learn to do his own laundry. My mother did that when I demanded she iron my jeans (it was the 80s, okay?!!), and it became an invaluable skill. And if he goes to school stinky, then he has no one to blame but himself. Oh, and I would kill for a 6:30 wake up as well. J has slowly but surely moved his back to 5 am again.
Claire--still suffering from the cold?
Do you feel as guilty as I do when they won't eat their solids? I look towards the one year deadline when food is no longer just for fun, and worry and worry that he will refuse it when he is actually
needs to eat it.
Rowan and Angel--because everything is pretty simple for us, we just use a computer program to file our taxes in March. I let my husband do it because I get all anxious about these things. But last year when he did it, he came down the stairs and said: "Well...we owe...seventeen thousand dollars."
At first I didn't believe him; I thought that he MUST be joking. But he wasn't. In fact, he later admitted that he low-balled it to make me feel just a bit better; it was actually EIGHTEEN thousand that we owed.
So, after regaining the ability to breathe, I asked him if he had double checked the numbers. He said no and went back upstairs to see. Turns out, he hadn't entered
the amount of taxes we had already paid. This was one of the times that I wonder how he makes it through life without help.
Rowan--Yay for the little climbing and walking M! I suspect that once Michael is born and your attention is divided, she's going to be getting away with a lot more!
As for us, we went to the Gymboree playtime today, and J behaved like a perfect gentleman. Oh, wait, no--we had to leave because J found a newborn sleeping in an infant carrier in a corner of the room, and no matter how far away I took him, he still made a bee-line for the baby. I have no idea what that was about...
Okay, got to go!
!!! Men ... And to think our boys might turn out like their fathers!!!! The good and the bad I guess!
so i knew the waterbirth wouldn't be an option. ended up with a very quick birth with just gas and air but it was assisted with ventouse. I would do a plan again but only as a guide as I know they rarely go as you want them.
luckily she still wantes her milk.
! 6:30am sounds wonderful
! So I told my oh that we are putting a gate this week. 
