EIGHT WEEKS OLD

James had his 8-week check up and first jabs today - and all went brilliantly. He's a smiley, healthy, happy chappy. And despite being in some discomfort from his jabs, after a nice bath, he went down to sleep as beautifully as he (almost) always does.

He really has been a dream child the past few weeks. He only cries when he's hungry (still at least every 3 hours) or tired. And when he's tired, he goes down to sleep really easily (often only for 25 mins and with the help of a dummy, but still...).

And I can't believe that after writing at just less than 5 weeks I had more or less decided to give up on the breastfeeding - we're still going. And it's improving. We're topping up a some of the feeds when I know they've not been good, and he gets formula at least one night-feed, but other than that it's all me. And he's piling on the pounds - 13oz in the past week alone.

Yet why am I still totally knackered? Yes - his big sister, as ever. After two nights of properly sleeping through, we're back to the up several times a night norm. And I think we managed about a week without a cough and a cold . They're both back with a vengeance again.

Plus Charlotte's got some new teeth coming through - making her a whinging, crying, unhappy, shouting, non-eating little girl once again. I do feel sorry for her, but at the same time there are days when she is really trying my patience and it makes everyone miserable. But we know it'll pass eventually - and at least there's evidence of actual teeth this time, and therefore a reason for her behaviour.

But tonight she's at her Grandma's. James is asleep for a few hours. So I'm treating myself to a curry and glass of wine, and it feels well deserved :)

Nap time

SIX WEEKS/20.5 MONTHS

Getting loads of proper smiles now :)

So I haven't given up breastfeeding after all :) Was so close last week, but pushed on through and each day things seem to be getting a little better.

I've had great support from the local hospital's breastfeeding 'guru' - she's been very encouraging, checking I'm doing everything right and not having a go at me for introducing the bottle or the odd bit of formula. The suggestion from her is that James is simply a hungry baby that needs feeding a bit more than we were used to with Charlotte. So that means top ups, or more frequent feeds - the latter of which isn't conducive to also looking after a 20-month old toddler.

So at the moment - I'm feeding James myself when he's awake enough and we've got the time, otherwise it's a bottle of expressed milk (or formula if we've not got enough), with top-ups from the bottle if he doesn't seem satisfied despite coming off the breast.

So a mish-mash of everything, which is hard work, but should get easier the more he's simply taking from the breast. And if he's full and winded, we have one very chilled out boy. In fact that's how both the bf woman and the health visitor described him - "chilled". Rather different to the "strong personality" we often heard to describe his sister!

Talking of her - she's having horrendous nights because of her constant cough once again. She's on another course of antibiotics after the doctor said she's got a lingering chest infection. But she seems happy enough in between coughing fits. 

Despite her rough nights, she's now sleeping in her 'big girl bed'. She kept ending up in it after cuddles to ease her cough anyway, so we thought we might as well try the full night. Unfortunately we've had one falling out incident, thanks to an ill-fitting bed guard (now rectified) - which ended up waking her up to the point of her thinking it was playtime, so ended up back in her cot. 

And I can hardly believe her speech can have improved even more week by week - but the full sentences she now comes out with astounds me. "Look Mummy - it's a breadstick", "Look Grandad, my jeans fell down!". The talking of a 3-year old if the experts and books are to be believed.

Lastly, for this post, we're trying to establish a bit of routine with James already - otherwise we have no idea where we're at. So we've started with bedtime. Bath, massage, feed, story, bed, starting at 6pm - just as we did with Charlotte from a similar age - and so far it seems to be working.

He definitely gets his longest sleep when he's gone down (usually between 7.30-8pm), and up for feeds roughly every 3-4 hours after that (usually around 11-30pm, 2am, and then anything between 0430 and 6am). But it's proving trickier in the day as he doesn't follow very much of a pattern from which to take his lead - other than alternating one very awake day and one very sleepy day. So any kind of napping schedule will have to wait, and I'm just feeding him when he's hungry or every 3-4 hours if it's not so obvious.

Oh, go on then - another picture of my smiley 6-week old:

SECOND BABY WORRIES

I feel like I've hardly mentioned my current pregnancy over the past few months. It's been all very straight forward until this week, when I had a second vomiting bug in three weeks and ended up in hospital.

I just couldn't keep a thing down for 12 hours - not even water - and so I was understandably concerned about how it would be affecting Twiglet. A quick trip to my GP and she rang the ante-natal clinic who saw me immediately. Everything was fine with Twiglet - we got to hear his/her heartbeat, and he/she was constantly on the move for what seemed like 24 hours (a bit of a worry in itself, but it's settled down now).

They kept me in for about 8 hours until I could keep down a few bottles of fluid - and thankfully I avoided the anti-sickness pills and a drip. But it meant that my OH had to take an important day off work (again) and we had to rely on grandparents to look after Charlotte. All which made me feel really guilty.

And that guilt got worse later in the week when Charlotte's nasty cough got worse and worse. After two pretty much sleepless nights (on the part of OH as he insists I sleep because I'm 7 months pregnant) her Dad took her to the doctors. They couldn't find anything really wrong, but gave her an inhaler to help just in case. He then took her to nursery, but they called a few hours later for her to be picked up as her cough was causing her so much distress. And through all of this, where was I? At work. Feeling increasingly guilty.

Because I'm self-employed if I don't go to work I don't get paid. If my OH takes (yet another) day off to help with the childcare he at least does still get paid. So on top of feeling guilty that it should be me looking after Charlotte when she's poorly, distressed and can't sleep, there's also the guilt  that he seems to be doing it all  (including battling to get her to eat anything once again) while I swan off leaving them to it when he's also had the bare minimum (if any) sleep.

Only working for one more month (and then it's only one or two days a week) - and then we'll have a whole world of new worries with Number Two. To be honest, the only thing that's really concerning me at the moment is breastfeeding the tiny one with a toddler demanding my attention at the same time.

In the early months it would take Charlotte at least an hour each time to feed - every couple of hours. I have no idea how I'll be able to do that AND look after Charlotte. But people manage somehow - hopefully she'll start playing a bit more by herself when she realises Mummy is busy. And hopefully the next one will sleep better in the day than she did so I can give her plenty of attention when her brother or sister is napping. That's a lot of "hopefully"s!

BRONCHIOLITIS

Not how we'd planned to celebrate my first Mother's Day. Charlotte's had yet another nasty cough and cold for the past couple of days, but Saturday night and Sunday morning were pretty horrendous with her really not being herself at all, and her chest was getting more and more rattly and wheezy.

So we took her to the out-of-hours doctor who told us she has Bronchiolitis and that he wanted her to go to hospital for observation. But when he rang them - based on the fact she was still eating just over half of what she'd usually eat -  they didn't want her admitted until she got worse.

Part of me was relieved not to have to see my little girl in hospital, but part of me thought that if the GP thought it was serious enough for her to be checked out there then maybe it was the best place for her. However, after a nice sleep in the car, she perked up enough in the afternoon for me to have a long relaxing bath while her Dad looked after her AND cooked us dinner, so I got my Mother's Day treats in the end :)

with her newly trimmed fringe which makes her look a bit like a boy!

Charlotte slept much better last night, thanks in part to a humidifier, and there doesn't seem much wrong with her appetite either. So she certainly looks to be on the mend, and is in very happy spirits today - albeit still with a rattly chest and cough, but hopefully that will clear soon enough.

COUGHS AND SPLUTTERS

Charlotte's got a stinky cold :( She's had a stuffy nose for more than a week, but in the past few days it's been joined by a nasty cough. And today she had a couple of major vomitting episodes after particuarly violent coughing. 

But in between her coughing and sneezing fits she seems perfectly happy (although it's affecting her daytime naps worse than ever), and she's not got a temperature. So I'm pretty confident it's just a winter cold and it will pass. But if it gets much worse, or doesn't clear up after the weekend, I will take her to be checked over by the doctor.

I think it's worse for us seeing her suffer and not being able to do much to help. All I want to do is help her blow her nose, but saline drops will have to do the trick until she's rather older! Feel so sorry for her, and giving her lots of cuddles and kisses so she knows how much we love her :)