Bumps, Babies and Birthdays

If you're reading this expecting a pregnancy announcement- congratulations! You're certifiably insane!

The bumps i refer to are those on Rudy's head, as a result of it having far too much sudden-contact with the floor recently.  In the past week alone he's flung himself head first from the bed twice and randomly fallen down on his head from standing so many times i have now lost count.

He has been practicing walking, and as much as he seems to enjoy the experience, i'm not sure his skull would agree, and my nerves are a bit withered with it all too.

It has been a week of birthdays, as apparently there's not much to do in October/November and almost everyone we know has a July/August birthday, or certainly it feels that way anyway.

Chris turned 29 on Thursday, he was supposed to go to uni to give a poster presentation or some other equally pointless endeavour that he hadn't done the prep work for, so instead we went out for a family breakfast

(Rudy demonstrates nicely why i don't usually bother to wear jewellery by attempting to remove my earrings with my ear lobe still attached- nice one Rudy, thanks for that!)

(Check me out Mum, i can stuff blueberries and strawberries in my mouth then hang upside down backwards outta my high chair over a tiled floor, and give you a heart attack during breakfast!)

Later, we had a picnic in the back garden

(Toby sporting a chocolate philadelphia moustache, have you tried that stuff?! The boys seem to be able to take it or leave it but i find it weirdly addictive!)

(And people wonder why i feel the need to bath/shower them every single night!)

Then on Saturday we had an actual birthday party for him, or rather a "Family friendly birthday barbecue", except that only a handful of (childless) people turned up, so it wasn't quite as advertised and we had rather a surplus of balloons, barbecue food, beer and cake!

Still, those of us who did attend enjoyed ourselves and the boys seemed to enjoy having people round, even if they were all of the grown-up variety.  Rudy went to bed at more or less the same time as usual although stirred a few times (probably due to unfamiliar voices travelling up the stairs and waking him up i reckon) and needed re-settling, Toby had a Very Late Night.  He had his new Batman PJs on from fairly early on in the evening, and as the night wore on he got more and more chilled, snuggling down on the sofa with a blanket to watch The Gruffalo, and The Gruffalo's Child on DVD and listen to the boring grown-ups chatting, then finally at 10.30 he said "My DO want to go to bed" so i took him up and he was asleep within mere minutes!

Chris's friend Chris (i know, confusing right, but Chris is a Christian whereas his friend is a Christopher, so that helps) came along with his SLR so we do have a few more, better quality photos but i don't have access to them right now i'm afraid.

My best friend Emma, who is marrying one of Chris's close friend's Ben (featured in my earlier entry: http://rebabyandbabies.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/matchmakers.html )

said at one point during the day "How can you not want another?! Look how good these two have turned out!"(indicating to the boys, who were scampering about playing with balloons) which made me smile, but then she ruined it by trying to get me to agree to have a third and even wanted to bump fists with me on it, which i understand is like legally binding or something?! So all my fuzzy feelings about the general awesomeness of my children were replaced by feelings of panic and horror at the notion of adding another to the mix.  Chris overheard and started frantically repeating his "Two is Enough" mantra over and over ( thankfully minus the rocking backwards and forwards that sometimes accompanies it)

Then last night i actually dreamed i DID have another baby.  The dream itself was mostly centered around the actual birth (for which my mother-in-law was present) It was an absurdly fast birth (which, in fairness to my subconscious, there's every chance it would be, as i believe 3rd babies are notorious for their unpredictable entries to the world) and even stranger was the fact that when the baby was first presented to me, it was a caucasian baby girl, but then it got taken away for a few moments for a little bit of resus and when it was returned it was a black baby boy...which in the dream panicked me slightly, but then when i looked around Chris was also black, so i relaxed a little and we began to talk about names. Toby was there (i'm not sure where Rudy was) and Chris said "What about Daniel" and i said to Toby "You could call him Danny" and Toby tried the word on his tongue- "Da-n-yal"...Honestly, it was trippy stuff, made more so because of the un-nerving, completely unrealistic realism.  And it was one of those dreams that takes place right towards the end of the night so when you wake up it's still right there, fresh in your mind, and you have a hard time adjusting back to reality.

Freaky dreams aside, we're absolutely done. I'm so sure.  I'm almost 100% definitely and totally sure.  I haven't blogged about my dramas with the coil because it all seemed a bit...well...gynaecological to be chatting away about on the internet but you may be pleased (or indifferent) to know that things are a little better now i had it switched to a different kind, so although we're not considering making any permanent alterations that would make Rudy the Eternal Youngest Child, we have got it covered for the next 5 years at least ;)

In the interests of being fair, aside from my fantastic boyfriend Chris(tian) here's the list of who else has been celebrating their birthdays these past couple of weeks:

Our springer spaniel Fudge who turned 6 on the 19th July! Happy Birthday Fudge! :)

Our aforementioned friend Chris(topher) who turned 30 a couple of days before Fudge! Happy Birthday Chris! :)

My little brother Kieran who we celebrated the 10th birthday of on the 25th July! Happy Birthday Kieran! :)

My (less) little sister Sophie who just turned 22 on the 29th of July! Happy Birthday Sophie! :)

Chris's uncle and mentor and friend Peter, who's birthday is TODAY but i have no clue how old he is! Happy birthday Peter! :)

And tomorrow is Chris's Mum's birthday, so Happy Birthday for tomorrow Joy! :)

Phew!

Taking it easy

Wow, what a difference a week makes! It would appear that monsoon season in Manchester is over, or at least we're experiencing some kind of interlude.  The past couple of days have been super sunny and HOT!  Today i put actual suncream on my children! And sun hats! (They took them off almost immediately after, but hey, the thought was there).

I'm acutely aware however that isn't really supposed to be a weather blog, and yet i spend such a lot of time blathering on about it, so going to stop talking about the current climate right about NOW.

I feel like i mostly blog when things are hard, like when i've had a bad day/week/month and need to vent, or at least just get all my thoughts OUT THERE instead of IN HERE where they'll send me crazy! So i feel a bit bad about that and even though it's late ish and i'm mega tired, i really wanted to even things out by writing an entry today, as i've had such a great day.

Now before anyone gets their hopes up i want to explain that by great i don't mean, those days that are super-awesome-but-totally-removed-from-reality, like birthdays, christmases, weddings, general parties and celebrations, holidays, and to a lesser extent perhaps, trips out to exciting places.  I just mean, great, ordinary, fun and easy.  I feel like I haven't had a day like that on my own with the boys in aaaages.  Almost from the minute we all woke up it just went ok.  I kept thinking that any minute something would happen to shatter the illusion of easy normality...but it just kept on going along fine.  I had to resist the urge to pinch myself to check i wasn't still half asleep in bed feeding Rudy or something.  Chris was up and out early for work, we spent the morning at home playing (Toby and Rudy) napping (Me and Rudy) and doing chores (just me), then after lunch we slapped on the suncream and headed out to the park.  Rudy fell asleep on the way and subsequently spent almost the entire afternoon like this:

I think he was just wiped out from the heat and the fact he'd been awake a lot during the night (again, from the heat, but also because he spent between 2am and 6am feeding pretty much!)

Toby and i on the other hand, were busy playing football/ball catch and hide and seek.  This is how you play hide and seek with a toddler by the way...

Me: "Ok, i'm going to close my eyes and count to ten, you go hide and i'll come look for you"*
Toby: Runs to most immediate and obvious 'hiding' location, i.e. behind nearest tree, or bobs down behind a shrub
Me: Finish counting, then walk around a bit "looking' for him. Pretend to be really puzzled and surprised, talking loudly to myself about "Oh dear, i can't find Tobias ANYWHERE, i really do think he is actually and COMPLETELY MISSING!" Do an exaggerated lean under the pram "Perhaps he's under here?"
Toby:  Jumping out "BOO!"
Me: Feigns shock "Oh there you are! You were hiding behind that tree the whole time!"

Then, when it's my turn to hide...

Toby: (Covers eyes with hands but spaces fingers wide and keeps eyes open so he can watch where you're going to hide) "One...two...three..." (waits for me to prompt)
Me: "Four..."
Toby: "Four...READY OR NOT HERE I COME!" Runs immediately over to where i am "hiding" and shrieks "Boo!" at me and starts laughing.

It's pretty hilarious.  Especially "Ready or not here i come!" because i have no idea where he's got that from and it's SO cute how he says it like it's all one word!

He also sat in a tree as you can see (he didn't climb it, but wanted to sit in it, so i lifted him up there!) and lay down in the grass, which i actually a pretty Big Deal for him (hence the photographic evidence) as he can be a bit funny about textures, and in particular grass, and it's taken a long time for him to even be comfortable sitting down on it, so yeah, that was new and unexpected!

I am struggling to explain how easy today was or to come up with reasons why (so i can try to replicate it).  There was almost a tantrum from Toby at one point but i miraculously managed to diffuse it, and there were tears from Rudy on the way home when he wanted out of the pram and to be fed, but we were in the middle of the street and very nearly almost home so i ploughed on, and there was a little bit of snatching and whining but it all felt very manageable, and very normal...not overwhelming or explosive as it sometimes can.  Definitely the weather and being able to spend 3.5 hours outside in the afternoon helped, but even before that, the morning passed without incident, and it was just so nice.


One of my many tasks this morning was laundry, and in particular, to wash Toby's toy Lapin.  This is a long-legged, dangly rabbit he was bought as a baby and Fell in Love with.

For a long while last year it was forgotten about but i sensed it had that something quality about it that would make it a timeless piece so put it away in his memory box and sure enough, since moving house it has been very much Back in Play after he re-discovered it.  So much so, that it even has to come with us places now, and yesterday took a trip with us to Lottie's house and was involved in a slight incident involving the spitting out of a raspberry (Toby was not a fan) which left poor Lapin looking very much like he had a port wine stain across the majority of his face. Toby was distressed but understandably hesitant about putting Lapin in the washing machine, but at the same time, was dismayed every time he looked at it's face to find that no, in fact the raspberry stain had not magically disappeared in the last 10 minutes since you last checked, kinda thing.  So in the washing machine he went, and i just had to hope he'd come out a. clean and b. in one piece!

So imagine my delight just over an hour later when i was able to triumphantly peg him out on the line to dry :)

Footnote
* I do not actually close my eyes.  Not because i am a cheat, but because i've watched far too many episodes of CSI, and know for sure that i do not want to be THAT cliche, opening my eyes to say "ready or not, here i come..." only to discover that while i was counting to ten, someone snatched him away, or he ran outta the park and in front of a car or some shit like that.  No thank you.  I have some anxiety issues.  I'll be keeping my eyes open just a slit whilst playing hide and seek...until he's at least...oooh, say...sixteen?

Here comes the rain again

Yes, i've been listening to my Eurythmics cd in the car.  Although like every cd that goes into the car for any length of time, it's now trashed, courtesy of the bloody cd player which scratches all the discs around the third/fourth track to the extent that anything from track two to track seven will jump/skip.

I generally only take copied discs in there now, but sometimes i forget. Ho hum.

Anyway, like the title of the song, and this blog entry suggests, it has been raining.  A lot.  Forever it seems actually.

I think i mentioned in a post earlier this year that the weather was going a bit apocalyptic...well it's doing it again.  Toby is wearing his wellies almost every day and we're using umbrellas and raincoats whilst the oodles of suncream i bought back in March is sitting in the airing cupboard melting because we've got the bloody heating on.  By the time the summer arrives, whenever that might be (next year?!) the boys will have long grown out of the shorts, t-shirts and sun hats i bought.  I have been racking my brains to think if it's ever been this bad before and i have had a sudden and vivid recollection of when i first moved to Manchester- mid July 2003.  I had a pile of mismatched furniture from my first flat in Chorley , a few tins of paint, some rollers and a microwave.  The novelty of having a friend with her own place had long since worn off for most of my friends as i'd been living on my own for almost two years at that point.  And in any case, most were staying in Chorley,  either indefinitely, or else until September when they'd be peeling off in various directions to begin their university adventures across the country.  The few that were coming to Manchester weren't coming until the festivities were starting- aka, Freshers Week.  I was early to the party.  And it was a definite case of out-of-sight, out-of-mind.

I spent day after day painting.  I'd get up, have breakfast, shower, paint until lunch time, microwave myself some noodles, eat them in front of Murder She Wrote or Diagnosis Murder, or Charlie's Angels, depending on what was on, then i'd paint some more, until it got dark, maybe watch some more TV or read a book, and then go to bed, and lie awake listening to the noises of the unfamiliar city.

And it rained.  It rained from the day i picked up the keys, right through to the week before uni started.  I remember that it just rained and rained and rained.  I can vividly recall standing on the kitchen counter, with a roller in my hand, painting the walls blood red, and looking out the kitchen window at my fire escape and watching the rain bouncing off it, and thinking, wow, it's true what they say about Manchester- the rainy city.

So maybe it's not the end of days.  Maybe Manchester just got all nostalgic and wanted to remind my of my first summer here.  If so, it's doing a good job.  Only this time of course, i have two little ragamuffins to entertain, which is soooo difficult when it's soooo wet all the time!

On Sunday there was a brief lull in the downpour.  Grey clouds were hovering but we decided to take a gamble and headed out to the park again.  We went to Cringle this time, a bit more of a walk for us than Greenbank but we had to get some milk from the shop anyway, and Rudy needed a sleep, and anyway the playground there is better :)

I'll leave you with the photos...

They actually make it look like a perfectly ordinary summer's day at the park, with the exception perhaps of Rudy's hat, jumper and blanket!...But just to balance it out a bit, check out the puddle at the entrance to the park- Toby had no idea what he was getting into, i mean, literally! He was pretty freaked out when he started sinking further and further in!

Things you cannot say out loud (so i will type them instead)

Here we go.

I look forward to going to work, for a break!

More than once i have received an e-mail from ebay about a free listing weekend and wondered idly if they have relaxed their policy on selling pets...(or children)

When Rudy starts to cry, after i've just spent an hour settling him and he's been asleep about 10 minutes, i do not think "Oh my precious baby- what could be the matter?" I think "Are you kidding me?!"

I frequently consider the merits of starting to drink. During the day. Heavily.  On the one hand, as the daugher of a (deceased) alcoholic, it seems like a truly terrible idea.  On the other hand, as the mother of two very small children, it seems like it might be the best idea i've ever had.

My favourite time of day is bedtime.

I'm a terrible mother.

I mean, really. Is it supposed to be this hard?!

I asked a friend of mine that very question last week and she said no, it shouldn't be, we should be living in tribes, helping each other out.  I think she's right.  Anyone interested in coming to live in a three bed terrace in Manchester with a mental health professional, an increasingly insane 20 something mother and her two increasingly demanding boys apply within for immediate vacanacy! The more the merrier! No animals unless you're fetching them to kill, cook and eat. We look forward to hearing from you...

Some shocking revelations.

So, you know in my previous post title i was musing if sleep was actually necessary to life? Turns out.  Yes it is.  In fact, it's amaaaaaazing!

Rudy slept through the night on Friday.  I was totally and thoroughly unprepared for this possibility.  He went to sleep around 7.30 ish and i followed around 10.30 ish, and the next thing it was ten to five in the morning and he was waking for a feed.  I fed him and he went back to sleep until 6am.  Awesome!  He hasn't done it since.  Thankfully i wasn't under any illusion that this was to become a regular thing, so i'm not too disappointed, at this stage it's just fantastic as a one-off event, and so well timed as well after my epic Awake For Nearly Forty Hours Straight Episode.

Another shocker, i'm sure you'll agree, is that there is such a thing as Too Much Chocolate.

"Surely not?!" I hear you gasp.  Well, hear me out on this one.

Today we made Chocolate Bran Flake Cakes.  The "healthy" alternative to chocolate cornflake cakes.  Made using cocoa powder, honey, butter and, you guessed it, bran flakes.  Having worked last night, and having got only 2 hours sleep when i got home this morning, i was not particularly in the mood for baking.  Admittedly, these cakes don't actually require baking, just sticking in the fridge to set, but you know what i mean.  Mixing ingredients up and making a mess of the kitchen.  Baking.  However, you may remember that Chris has two assignments due in less than two weeks, and so while Rudy was napping this afternoon he was trying to read a textbook on reflection whilst Toby was bouncing around making a lot of noise and becoming increasingly frustrated that Daddy wasn't playing with him.  I decided that baking was the answer and bundled him through to the kitchen.

Unfortunately it didn't go so great.

I followed the recipe to the letter, but at the end found myself staring at what was essentially a pile of very dry looking bran flakes.  Well, bran flakes. Which by their very nature are very dry. With just a smear of chocolate across the top of them.  This can't be right, i thought to myself, we need more chocolate.  This is around the point Toby lost interest in 'helping' and decided he just wanted to 'watch' whilst playing with his toy robot*

Mere moments later Rudy lost interest in napping, and, well it all just fell apart a little bit.  I cobbled the cakes together myself, gave Rudy a wooden spoon to lick and gave Toby some alphabet fridge magnets to play with.  Chris gave up on his book and started preparing dinner.

Here are our cakes:

They are too chocolatey.  I mean, really.  You wouldn't think too much chocolate could be a bad thing would you? But it can.  These cakes are the proof.  The experience is how i imagine it would be to eat solid cocoa.

Rudy disagrees:

But Toby is nothing if not brutally honest.  And was more interested in an episode of Abney and Teal he's watched at least twenty times (if not more) previously, than in sampling the cuisine!

So it's been a lazy ish day at home today, i am hoping we can get outdoors and do something a bit more active tomorrow.  Chris is in work all day though so it will require some bravery on my part.  We spent the afternoon at the park yesterday though, all 4 of us plus the dog.

It reminded me how good it is just to get out, even if it's not to go anywhere or do anything particularly mind-blowing, just the fresh air, and change of scenery does us all good.  So i'm planning to rinse and repeat tomorrow, weather permitting of course.  We don't mind a bit of drizzle, but on the whole Toby isn't a big fan of rain.  Ten minutes of splashing in puddles and he's tired and complaining of wet feet and wanting to go home. So let's hope for a dry day for all our sakes.

Footnote

*which is not, in fact a toy robot at all.  It's a Helghan figurine, these are, i am told, alien creatures from an 18-rated PS3 game called Killzone 3.  Chris got it as part of a collector's edition.  Yes he's a geek.  Quite how it then became one of Toby's most favourite toys i'm not sure.  It happened at some point during the house move, clearly when our parenting skills had lapsed somewhat. Toby could have picked up a crack pipe off the street and adopted it as his "Favourite and Best" and we probably wouldn't have flinched, such were our stress and preoccupation levels!