Doing it for the kids

For the past few weeks Katie's favourite hobby has been bird watching.

 

Whenever she spots a bird (and she's really sharp-eyed, spotting ones way before us) she points at it and says: "Bird."

 

Except she doesn't pronounce the 'd'.

 

And sometimes she points at dogs and says the same thing.

We should have been in Portugal this weekend. Katie's uncle Rob got married today to Leo but Katie (and I) weren't well enough to travel so Urs went on her own.

 

Urs had been under the weather on Thursday, too.

 

I wasn't quite sure how best to mark the day, given that Katie and I were a few hundred miles away from where we should have been.

 

So we made a video:

 

  

Hurrah!

 

I got a bucket, spade and beachball from Katie which will come in useful when we go on holiday.

We've gone from four teeth to seven in such a short space of time.

 

That plus the MMR jab reaction probably explains Katie's, er, challenging beahviour recently.

 

Yesterday Urs had her at home and bore the brunt of it.

 

I came back to see the two of them walking happily down the street together. It was a lovely sight (Katie's a lot more confident in her walking now) but it kind of masked how tough the day had been.

 

Swings and roundabouts...

We met up with friends from our NCT class this weekend for a picnic in the park.

 

Good fun.

 

And Katie had an ice cream.

 

Which she liked a lot.

 

It was parents' evening at nursery last week.

 

A friend kindly babysat Katie for us. This fortunately involved nothing more than sitting on our couch until we got back as Katie was on her best behaviour in her cot ie fast asleep.

 

Which hasn't always been the case recently. Some kids have an early reaction to their MMR jab, others may have a reaction seven to 10 days later. And that appears to be what happened, what with Katie's appetite being all over the place and her sleeping habits too - we've had a 2:45am session and a 4am session in the past week, which have left us all a bit tired.

 

Anyway, off Urs and I went to nursery to find out how things are going.

 

We had a good look round at the room where she will move shortly. As she can stand and walk on her own she's ready to move up to the next group but she will have to wait until one of the kids in that section moves onto the group after that, such is the number of toddlers and babies in our area right now.

 

The nursery provides a 'development folder' that shows some of Katie's artwork and lists some of the things she can do - all Ofsted approved, no doubt. I've shown a few of her early masterpieces in previous blog posts. She also had some of her work on the walls including some pasta she had glued onto a piece of paper. Tony Hart, eat your, er, heart out.

 

Overall the nursery workers are pleased with her progress and we're pleased with the people looking after her.

 

Such is the demand for places from new parents now, the nursery is accepting only applications for five days a week. No more part-timers like us. Lucky we got in when we did.

I was away in the US this week on a training course - left on Tuesday, came back Saturday morning.

 

Good time, learned a lot but it felt like I was away for far longer.

 

When I stumbled through the front door after an awful red-eye flight Katie was there to greet me with a nice smile and a hug.

 

Ah.

 

Just what a jet-lagged dad needs.

There I was pushing Katie on the swing in the park when a lady with two children come over. One went on the other swing while the elder one played on some of the things in the park - various climbing things and slides etc.

 

There is one plaything that is wooden and looks like a steam train engine. It has steps up and a slide down but the front part is just a horizontal hollow tunnel and so a kiddie climbing along it can, in theory, fall out the end. I've never seen it happen (most kids are far too sensible for that*) but it requires a bit of parental vigilance.

 

The lady next to me at the swings spotted that the elder child might reach the end of the funnel and so she rushed over and dived head first into the funnel - this really is quite some feat - speed, bravery and physical flexibility are all required in high doses. It's way beyond what I reckon I could do.

 

Danger averted, she came back over.

 

"Crikey," I said. "I find it challenging enough keeping an eye on one child. I can't imagine what it's like when you've got two."

 

"Oh they're not mine," she said, "I'm their gran."

 

 

* When Urs and I visited the Grand Canyon a few years ago one of the rangers told us that kids never fall off and plunge into the abyss below. They're far too sensible. The only ones who do this are young blokes - late teens, early 20s - who think they're immortal and who get too near the edge posing for photos or trying to look down.

 

Says it all, really.

 

Katie has had four teeth for a while.

 

The fourth one had come through at Easter when we were on hols in the Lake District.

 

But now it looks like numbers five and six are on their way.

 

Could that explain why Katie's not been her usual happy self this evening?

Week 65 and we've broken the 2,500 nappy barrier.

Crikey.

 

End of week 64 and we're at 2,470 nappies.

Looks like Katie is over the worst of the hand, foot and mouth disease that I mentioned in a previous post.

 

It hasn't been fun but she's been a lot more smiley and energetic in the past few days.

Katie's walking is coming on fine.

 

We took her out in the garden today while Urs' mum was visiting.

 

Katie raced up and down on the grass.

 

As usual you hope she lets all her energy out but you end up being the one who is more tired - it's the picking her up and chasing after her that does it.

 

 

 

 

  

 

On our fridge we have a variety of fridge magnets some of which make noises when pressed.

 

Katie likes playing with them, which can be a handy distraction when you're trying to get something done in the kitchen.

 

She's also discovered the washing machine is good for putting things in...

 

 

 

 

 

 

End of week sixty-three and the nappy count has reached 2,428.

The only good thing about this blog post is the headline as I like a good pun.

 

Anyway, here we go:

 

In the past few days Katie got a rash. Or load of red spots. Hard to tell.

 

She was also a bit out of sorts. Not eating as much as usual. Crying a lot more etc.

 

How to decide what the rash/red spots/behaviour were all about:

 

Was it chicken pox?

 

Was it hand, foot and mouth?

 

Was it nothing?

 

Or, guess what? An unspecified viral infection. I've written about that before.

 

Answer: go see the doctor.

 

On the first visit to the doctor the decision was that it was a viral infection. Cue my usual scepticism.

 

It hadn't spread to her hands, although her mouth was so sore she had real problems eating anything. And when your child doesn't eat enough I can tell you from personal experience they'll let you know they're hungry. Of course, when they try to eat something it hurts because their mouth is sore. And your child will let you know about that too. All that plus a lack of sleep adds up to one challenging child.

 

Poor Urs bore the brunt of it this week.

 

On Wednesday she noticed some more spots on Katie's hands so back to the doctor they went.

 

What's up this time, doc?
This time it was diagnosed as hand, foot and mouth.

 

Now don't panic - hand, foot and mouth is not the same as foot and mouth that cattle get.

 

But that doesn't mean it's a barrel of fun.

 

You can find out about hand, foot and mouth on the NHS direct website.

Below I've pasted some bits from it:

Symptoms of hand, foot and mouth disease usually start to appear 3-7 days after being infected with the virus.

The early symptoms of hand, foot and mouth disease include:

• fever,
• loss of appetite,
• sore throat,
• small flat or raised red spots in the mouth, throat, and skin.
• generally feeling unwell.

After 12-36 hours, any red spots will develop into yellowy-red ulcers (lesions) in your mouth, around the roof of your mouth, tongue and inside of your cheeks. These ulcers may be sore and uncomfortable, making it difficult to eat, drink and swallow.

After 1-2 days, sores may develop on the palms of your hands, the soles of your feet, and between your fingers and toes. In some cases, they also develop on the buttocks and genitals. The sores last for about 3-6 days and may be itchy and uncomfortable. They are smaller than chicken pox sores.

Of course, this is a viral infection.

And it also explains why the diagnosis wasn't made first time around.

 

We will need to be careful because:

 

NHS direct says:

 

Hand, foot and mouth disease treatment
And how do we treat it? Well...

 

Oh joy.

 

 

So, er, that yoghurt I tried to encourage her to have by eating some of it off her spoon myself...oh dear, not good.

 

Still, I have been good at comforting her by hugging and kissing her. Let's see what NHS Direct says about that:

 

 

Oops.

 

Well she'll cheer up when she goes to nursery, right?

 

 

So she won't be able to go to nursery and she'll be at home.

 

Which means one of us won't be going to work.

 

We had a good week away in the Lake District at Easter.

 

Various pics below.

 

We took Katie to see Wycombe Wanderers thrash Morecambe 1-0 at Christie Park a few weeks ago.

 

Not a high quality match but a good result for the Blues.

 

Our friends even got Katie a mention on the tannoy at half-time.

As any parent will, er, probably know Noo-Noo is the vacuum cleaner in the Teletubbies' house.

 

Our own Noo-Noo did some tidying up the other week and Katie got quite excited about it.

 

The air blew her hair about which was fun.

 

 

Katie now has four teeth fully through.

 

Her contemporaries generally have quite a few more.

 

Her fourth one came though while we were on holiday, which explains the 2:13am 'fun' one morning.

I'm catching up on some blog posts I meant to do a while ago but, well, you know what happens when you have a small child around (I suspect it's the same when they're bigger, too).

 

This one is about the most recent NCT Nearly New Sale.

 

Long-term readers of this blog will know that I have dispensed advice on how to make the most of these excellent events (basically, turn up early).

 

Well this time we went one stage further this time. Instead Urs volunteered to help by working on the check-outs. This gave her the chance to buy stuff before the sale opened to the public.

 

Katie and I stayed at home.

 

Urs staggered home with bags of bargain clothes and a few toys:

 

In recent days Katie has been saying "ba-ba" (bye-bye) a lot.

 

She even said it this evening when Laa-Laa was waving goodbye on the latest Teletubbies DVD that I acquired.

 

And today when we gave her a cuddly Bob the Builder (hand-me down from cousin) and we said "Bob" she replied: "Bob". Ahh.

 

She also tried to say "Ossie" for the first time which is the name of Urs' teddy bear but it didn't sound much like Ossie.

 

She's still saying "dada" a lot.

 

Which is nice.

End of week sixty and we have reached 2,319 nappies.

At the end of week 58 we hit 2,237 nappies.

Katie has officially started walking.

 

She still prefers to hold onto something but is now happily taking quite a few unaided steps at a time.

 

When it suits her.

 

Which is why this video wasn't easy to get.