9 days old! Photos!

Well my little Squidge, Christopher, is now 9 days old! I can hardly believe that it's been so long since he rocketted into the world and into our lives well and truly :)

He is such a delightful, calm baby, full of lots of lovely expressions.







I could just cuddle him for hours if there wasn't the need to get things done, or sleep! He has yet to cry for anything other than a nappy change! When I think back to Robert as a newborn, I'm SURE he used to cry a whole lot more! Part of me is wondering whether it's our attentiveness and the fact that we are so much more experienced as parents this time round? But either way he is very calm, and he will sleep in his cot with no problems, or in his bouncer, meaning that we can spend a lot of time playing with Robert and I think this is helping him to adjust to having a new tiny baby brother!

Christopher and I had been home only a few hours, when Robert decided he wanted to join Christopher in having some Mummy Milk. :) I am so happy that Jonathan took some photos of my first time tandem feeding my two boys!





It has certainly eased jealousy and I am more than happy to allow Robert to join his brother if he asks. Now, Robert will sometimes reach over and hold Christopher's hand while they both nurse :) It's so sweet! So sweet, I just embarrassingly had a strong let down thinking about it and leaked all over my top!









He really is a sweet big brother :)

Anyway, tonight we have put a duvet and pillow on Robert's cot for the first time, and he's already once climbed out and started crying, so I put him back in, tucked him in and sang him more songs... he seems to find it quite cozy but it is so different to him as he's not slept under a cover since he was about a few months old (since we discovered baby sleeping bags!), and he sleeps on his front, with just his jammies on. So hoping that he will get on well with it! Fingers crossed!

Phew.. a new day. 5 weeks 2 days

Yesterday was AWFUL. I'm sure if you have me on facebook you already know this!

It went something like this:

Nicola is wondering what today will bring as Robert was up screaming at 3am and moaning every half hour before then, presumably due to his 2 naps. We shall see!
Yesterday at 08:50

Nicola is going braindead from all the screechy screaming of a 14 month old who is tired but WILL NOT SLEEP! Arghhh!
Yesterday at 11:49

Nicola has given up.
Yesterday at 12:46

Nicola from 2 naps yesterday to none today. Hurrah. Roll on 6pm. He can go to bed early tonight. And so will I.
Yesterday at 15:48

Nicola is listening to Robert screaming downstairs, he's in his highchair with a ham sandwich in front of him (his favourite) but he's still screaming and I don't know why... need 5 minutes breather... the sooner he goes to sleep the better, before I lose my mind or worse.... :(
Yesterday at 16:58

Nicola is now listening to Robert screaming in his cot. Anyone notice a recurring theme in these status updates today?
Yesterday at 17:44

Nicola is now on strike until Jonathan goes to work tomorrow morning unless there is an emergency. I have officially had ENOUGH.
Yesterday at 18:36

So yeah, basically he screamed ALL DAY. And by the end of it I was screaming right along with him, and sobbing into the sofa. And wondering WHY ON EARTH anyone wants more than 1 child??!? And wondering what on earth I had done becoming pregnant again... And wondering how I'd cope if Robert has days like that regularly... or if a year from now I have two screaming children and I'm at the end of my tether...

He finally DID eat his sandwich, once I let him out of his highchair and he calmed down, he then grabbed a bit off the table and walked around eating it, which I never usually let him do but yesterday I was too upset and stressed to worry about (more) crumbs on the carpet.

I put Robert down to sleep at 5.30pm. He finally actually dropped off to sleep (cried himself to sleep) at just before 6. I crawled into bed thinking thank GOD finally I can get some sleep myself. I had JUST drifted off to sleep when I heard screaming that carried on for 5 minutes before I thought I should get up... it was 6.25. Arghhh! I was sooooo pissed! Newly pregnant (and thus very tired all the time) with no naps at all that day, urgh I was so so so tired! Finally Robert went to sleep at 7pm. I went downstairs, made myself a hot chocolate, and put some stargate on, and that's where Jonathan found me when he came home, and told him that Robert was now his responsibility until he went to work tomorrow. Came upstairs, read a few forums while Jonathan ate his cereal (his tea - I didn't feel like any), and then I went to bed at 8pm. And this morning I do feel better for it.

But boy, I sure felt like the worst mum on the planet yesterday :( Going to make it up to him though.

Right now I'm just pleased because Robert went to sleep very quickly in his cot for his nap, no holding or rocking him for the entire time necessary. I think it's safe to say he's back to his 1 nap a day after only 1 day with 2 again ;)

Oh and the three of us all have colds. Arghh! Nevermind, and thanks for reading what was quite a ranty entry!

Robert's sleep was very erratic yesterday. He fell asleep on me downstairs (!) at 10.30am, we moved upstairs at 11am, and he slept then until 12.30. Then he slept for another hour at 4pm (!) which I was amazed at, he hasn't had two naps for MONTHS!

Then went to bed around 8-8.30 or so. However, he was up screaming at 3am, having had moans every half hour for the previous 3 hours.

He's acted tired a LOT this morning, and have just in the last few minutes put him in his cot but he's crying and will see if he'll settle, will go and settle him if he hasn't in a few minutes.

I have no idea what the day will bring regarding naps, or how his sleep will go tonight, but it's just a case of wait and see I think!

I am needing to nap every day. I am physically and mentally exhausted. And even if I go to bed early, more often than not I am still awake when Jonathan comes to bed, due to thoughts swirling around in my mind for hours keeping me awake! Last night wasn't so bad for that luckily, but due to aforementioned 3am waking I am still absolutely knackered, my eyelids are so heavy!

I am still having spotting regularly. That's all it is though, spotting. The second it progresses into more severe bleeding I'm phoning up the doctor. It's bright red spotting so it is always worrying me a little, but as it's not much, and clears up quickly, I am still confident it is just implantation.

I have my first midwife appointment booked, for Tuesday 23rd February at 3pm. The timing is a bit of a pain actually as Tuesday afternoons is when the in-laws come over, MIL looks after Robert while FIL takes me shopping. And as we are keeping it a secret from family and friends until we have the scan, I can't tell them I have a midwife appointment! So I'll either cancel, say I don't need to go shopping, and take Robert with me, or I'll tell them I have a smear test, and take a big bag to hide the folder I'll be given.

Anyway, I have to go... Robert is still screaming, he won't settle at all even though I can tell he's tired, it's got to the stage where he's screaming in a screechy manner even though I keep going in there to sing and re-settle him.. Argh! Remind me why I wanted another!!!

Robert's sleep

I cannot BELIEVE how good Robert's sleep is now!!! It went from every few hours waking for milk at 8 months old or so, to waking a couple times and needing resettling, to waking after 10 hours solid sleep giving us an early morning wake-up call and then him refusing to sleep, to going to bed between 7 and 7.30. Waking up around 5am to 6am, then going back to sleep until 8am-8.30 and in one case this week 9am! I almost feel human again!

Anyway that's all I really felt like saying. There is a lot for us to do tonight as tomorrow we're going to Kent. Hope you are all well, thanks for reading x

Week of antibiotics, sleeping through (!!!!!)

Well Robert's eye is getting better. On Monday morning it was so puffy and red, poor love looked like he's been in a boxing ring for a couple of rounds! Now though it's not red, but there's a scabby bit which I'm assuming is meaning it's healing!



You can see it there, but as you can tell he's still his happy smiley self, grinning away. :)

Yesterday was messy play at the surestart centre, and as Jonathan is off work, we both went along to it. So Jonathan brought his camera as we were both around it was easier to take photos. One of the ladies who works there, Julie, came up to us and said as we've been coming along since Robert was 5 weeks old, she would like to use photos of Robert at the surestart centre to show people at the open day for their 1st birthday on how surestart can help even young babies in their development, so she asked for photos of the messy play session we did yesterday that Jonathan took, and also any others we might have had lying around (I had a few on my phone I took at other sessions). We did get some lovely photos, especially since this session was outside in the adjoining nursery garden, so lots of lovely natural sunlight. As it was a hot day, there was plenty of water play, and there was a big sand pit, along with other things like paint, sawdust soil and water to mix, and a big tray filled with soil, and vegetables, plastic pots, and toy trowels, gardening gloves etc.

This was the water and balls in the paddling pool. The nursery has a HUGE shaded section which is fab, and they'd put the water there. There was also a big sandpit and some climbing frames off in the unshaded bit, and a bit of grass.




The sandpit was quite large, and Robert enjoyed his time in there although he did seem more interested in the toys they'd put in there rather than the sand!






More water play. Robert does this in the bath too, tries to grab the water as it is falling down in front of him :)



When we put him in the soil tray, he didn't really like it, he cried straight away, and only really stopped crying when we gave him a carrot to hold! Then he went crawling away at the first opportunity!



My clever little Sausage realised that it was much more comfortable to walk along on all fours rather than crawling traditionally on the hard ground. :)





Drinky time :)



It was a lovely session and we got some fab photos!

Anyway, whether it's due to the antibiotics, or simply because things have clicked, Robert is now sleeping through!!!! I cannot express how good this is and how pleased we are to have a decent night's sleep! He has been nightweaned too! Not had any milk from when he goes to bed til around 6am the next day! I am sooo hoping that Robert continues like this after we finish his antibiotic course, as I am worried it will go back to the hourly wakings!

This morning Jonathan and I got a lie in til about 8am ish - when we went into Robert's room we found out why.... he'd taken off his nappy and smeared the contents all over his cot, and all over himself... *sigh* (if you want to see the photo, click here. Jonathan thought it'd be a good idea to take it LOL and since it's there I couldn't help but share but didn't want to force you to look at it!)

Right, lastly.... I am going to try and get some cheap pregnancy tests soon. We have been doing the deed regularly since we decided to start again, and since we have now nightweaned Robert it's entirely likely my periods may return or at least that I will ovulate, so I may get pregnant soon or be pregnant already (!!!). I do keep feeling odd feelings down there, but I think most of it must be in my head, but it can't hurt to have some cheapy tests available just to check! I'm still really not bothered when it happens. I know it WILL happen sooner or later, and whenever it does I will be happy!

Poorly eye :(

Yesterday we had our first medical worry with Robert since he was born. Well apart from colds, but they're commonplace really. But pretty good considering he's nearly 9 months old.

We noticed when he woke up at 6am on Sunday morning that his left eye was quite red and a little swollen. At first we just assumed that maybe it was just from tiredness, or something like that, but kept an eye on it to make sure. By lunchtime it was still no better at all, and we discussed going to the doctor about it, since it was a Sunday. But although Robert didn't seem too bothered by it, it did look really sore so in the end I did decide to ring up NHS Direct about it, and a few hours later I got a call back from a nurse who after talking to me about it decided that it was probably a good idea to get him seen to that day, so she booked him an appointment at the local hospital out of hours clinic.

It turns out that my little baby has an infection in his lower eyelid, which the doctor said wasn't a stye. But he gave us some oral antibiotics to give him so we've gave him some when we got home and then again when he woke around 10.30pm. By morning it looked like it had got worse, and stayed very red and inflamed looking most of the day, so we called the doctors and we got him another appointment. Strangely between booking the appointment and when the appointment was for, it seemed to suddenly get a bit better. The swelling came down a bit, and the redness receded but it's still got the infection there you can tell. The doctor who saw him today said it was a stye (!) as there was a lump on the inside of the eyelid (Robert did not like this at all!!), and said that it was evident that it HAD got better (we took along a photo of how it looked yesterday) so the antibiotics were obviously doing their job. But gave us a different sort that we have to give alongside the first, which evidently makes him sick if he doesn't have an empty stomach as we found out earlier this evening... But we are hoping it will clear up soon, as it does look so sore.

Last night we had a mini-breakthrough with the sleeping issues. Although we still didn't get a huge amount of sleep, we did get slightly more than the night before, but also that I remember (!!!) Robert went the whole night from 8pm-ish til 6.30am-ish without breast feeding. I am so looking forward to properly nightweaning completely, although it was lovely snuggling down with my baby boy in the dark of night, it has got to the stage where I just need my sleep so badly I am willing to fore-go this snuggly time in order to function well the next day! I just can't wait til he sleeps from 7-7 or even better 8-8 and we can feel like we're on top of the world! So far tonight he has been sleeping since around 7.30pm. I will breastfeed him when he does wake up, since he hasn't actually had anything since 6pm due to the antibiotics.

Ok, well he woke up as soon as I typed that sentence, so I fed him and he's back to sleep. Hopefully I will be able to get away without feeding him again til morning now. I might well prepare the antibiotics in the syringes so we can give them to him when he wakes up in the morning.

Before I sign off I shall leave you with a few new photos.


Obviously before the eye infection!







Breast feeding going strong at almost 9 months old :)

Sleep struggles, photos

We are very badly struggling with Robert's sleep lately. We barely get 6 hours sleep a night, and those 6 hours are broken into 2 or 3 blocks where he wakes and needs resettling. I went and reread a passage in the No Cry sleep solution, on the different phases for helping a baby resettle in his cot, so we started with phase 1 last night, that is breastfeeding him until sleepy, taking him off and rocking him IN his cot until asleep. Only both Jonathan and I find it hard to get down into that position, so mostly what we do is I breastfeed him til sleepy, then put him in his cot and rock his back or pat his back until he's asleep. He now pretty much always sleeps on his front, or sometimes on his side, but never on his back anymore. Once he started rolling he settled himself on his front and although he couldn't roll back onto his back at first we left him on his front because he was more than capable of lifting his head, and his arms.

Last night went okay. He woke up a few times, but I think it was less than the night before. And after a bellyfull of milk was always drowsy enough to go to sleep quickly in his cot. At 6am I realised I must have fallen asleep with him, so I got up and put him in his cot, and ooops! Big mistake, he woke up and I should have let him sleep! Since 6am is around the time he usually won't go back to sleep! Anyhow, I got up and rocked him, for about 10 or 15 minutes, then tried him on the breast, but he started fidgetting, then got up and rocked again, he burped, rocked some more, then tried him again on the breast and he fell asleep! And didn't wake up til 8.20! Wooohooo! His head was all clammy and sweaty from laying on my arm though.

But I do feel a bit more lively today. Yesterday I was soooo sleep deprived I was crying with Robert crawling around on the floor while Jonathan was upstairs catching a few zzzs. (he'd let me have an hour or so just before) Luckily Robert got tired soon after, and we had a massive long nap together.

Anyway it's something we have to persevere at but hopefully before long we will be able to night wean him and get him resettling himself so we can have a huuuuuge long sleep each night!! We have managed to clear out the spare room enough to get his cotbed in there, although it needs more sorting out. But once his cotbed is up in there, we can move the bookcases into our bedroom, and then hopefully sort out the rest. We are aiming to get the cotbed up in his own room this Friday. THIS FRIDAY!!! I can't wait, I really hope it'll help the sleep situation! Although I will probably miss him being right there for a while, and maybe wake up in a sweat wondering where he is, etc! I used to do that when we spent best part of the night co-sleeping, if he'd been put down in his cot again in the middle of the night, I'd wake up in a panic and wonder where he was, if he'd fallen out of bed or something!

Anyway onto the TTC (for lack of a better acronym) thing... I am hoping that moving him into his own room and starting to night-wean him will bring about my period ;) We have now done the deed 3 or 4 times without protection, so it is entirely possible I may be pregnant, although very unlikely because I am still period-less. But I am really really looking forward to being pregnant again! And find myself wondering will it be a boy or a girl? Wondering when I will conceive, and what time of the year it will be born. I have a feeling it will be a summer baby, perhaps July or August next year. Which will be a conception of October/November this year. For some reason I am feeling phantom kicks a lot lately, wondering if it is my desire to be pregnant which is causing it!

Right, well it's photo time! We bought Robert a ball-pool come paddling pool a few weeks ago. It's quite a cute thing, and he LOVES it, clambers into it, tries to get the balls in his mouth, it's quite funny watching him!





It even comes with inflatable rings to go around the posts holding up a little canopy thing to act as a sunshade if you use it as a paddling pool. Which Robert loves pulling off and putting in his mouth!

We took it into the garden for him to splash about in on Friday I think it was. He loved it and spent AGES in there! We left a few of the balls in as well for him to play with, and added some bowls, jugs, yoghurt pots etc for him to play with in there too.













So so cute if I do say so myself!

On Saturday we went to Emberton Country Park, which is about half an hour's drive from us. It was lovely! We got there for around midday, and it was fairly quiet. We parked under a tree, and set up the picnic blanket (a mahooooosive one, that could probably easily fit 6-8 adults sitting and food), and we had a lovely afternoon lazing about! It got busier fairly quickly, with a huge group setting up camp not far from us with a barbecue or two going, tonnes of deckchairs, an inflatable goal post and other stuff! But it was still fairly peaceful. After our lunch was spotted by several wasps, we decided to pack up and go for a walk, and let Robert go on the swings which he really enjoyed :)





And a little go on a rocking chicken...



And the roundabout...



which made me feel a little queasy especially when I looked down at the floor! I don't think Robert enjoyed the roundabout as much as the other two.

He is doing SO well at everything really, apart from sleep I suppose ;)

He absolutely loves his food, I decided to make more of a concerted effort to give him some veg and not just fruit, bread, other easily prepared stuff that's a bit samey. So I gave him some carrot and cauliflower, and he loved it :) He particularly seemed to enjoy the cauliflower, as he went back for more and more before starting the carrot!





He is also becoming more and more daring with regards to standing, cruising, etc. He is cruising with ease now, and even enjoys walking things along the floor, for example the upturned laundry basket, and his push along trolley which we've altered to make the handle bar sit above the trolley rather than bending over the floor (and therefore tippable), and he will now scoot it along the floor with glee! He is now beginning to practise standing alone, which he has done for 8-9 seconds now before plomping down onto his bottom, or grabbing hold of whatever he let go of. We have some video footage of him standing in his ball pool, with his head against the canopy thing, and using simply his head against that he's remained balanced otherwise on his own for more than 30 seconds! It is so scary to think my almost 9 month old is so close to walking! He's growing up so quickly! It seems like absolute ages ago that my now-not-so-little boy was unable to roll or move on his own at all! And to know he's grown at least 20 centimeters since he was born seems crazy! I totally can't remember him being tiny!

Right, well to finish off, here are some photos of Robert laughing. :)





Baby laughs are the most precious thing in the whole world :)

8 weeks 2 days old - smiles, and sick. Lots and lots of sick

Thank you so so so so much for the lovely comments on Robert's photos!! I really do thrive on your comments and I really love seeing the email pop up "You have new comments" :)

Today has been for the most part lovely. An hour or so at the Surestart Centre, which well, it was a bit meh today - the three other mums with babies who weren't crawling yet were all friends and very buddy-buddy with each other. So I did feel a little left out. And they were a bit chavvy too.. But it did get us out of the house for a couple of hours. I stopped by tesco to get some olive oil (for baby massage on Thursday) and somehow some chocolate snuck in too! ;)

Then at home followed a really lovely few hours - til about 5.30. We sat and he fed beautifully, he took some lovely naps in my arms, and I just sat there, holding him staring down at his beautiful soft cheeks and just kissed them over and over, and whispered to him how much I love him. In between the two naps he took in the time we got back at 5.30ish he was looking at me, straight into my eyes, and giving me these absolutely beautiful smiles. He smiles more and more every day, but it's not often he does actually look us RIGHT in the eyes and smile as though right there and then he's the happiest baby in the world and there's nowhere else he'd rather be than in my arms looking at me. Mostly he smiles at toys, or smiles and looking around him. But when he looks me straight in the eye and smiles, it's like my heart melts and I can't help but cry tears of joy.

We took a nap upstairs in bed together (him on my chest) and it felt like we'd slept loads when I woke up I felt really refreshed which isn't always usual for naps. I changed him (he was still quite sleepy), and then took him down for a feed. From there on it was a tough evening - he puked up practically everything he ate. It was tough on me, it was like all the milk I was giving him was going to waste. A muslin got soaked through mopping up all the milk he threw up, plus my top now has about 5 milk stains on it (it's a white top so it's not that visible), my trousers have a big wet patch - well, had, it's dry now, and his top has probably had milk all over it in various patches over the course of the evening. Jonathan came home, cuddled him for a while, and then gave him back to me while he went and cooked dinner. In that time I fed him again - and he puked it all up. I put him in his bouncer, and sat back down on the sofa and cried - and he cried too which made me cry harder.

Then just before dinner was ready I fed him again - he puked a lot of that up, but I managed to catch it with a new clean muslin. Then I fed him again, and only a little bit of sick that time. He seemed quite happy in his bouncer while we ate, and since then I've been upstairs about an hour while Jonathan's looked after him and not heard him cry. It's now my turn to look after him. I'm wondering what we should do. I still have several sachets of that rehydrating fluid powder stuff from the doctor, maybe I should try him on that tomorrow if he's still sick lots.

Anyway, better go, he probably wants a bit of food now. Hope you're all okay.

Robert weighed, better day

Today went better. It makes a lot of difference to get out of the house - a change of scenery and all that. I went to the Surestart Centre, Robert was the youngest baby there, the next youngest was 5 months, and the rest were all crawling and such.

Then I went to have him weighed, he's now a whopping 12lb 3oz!

This afternoon the longest nap he's had was 1 hour. Since then he's had hardly any, and just spent more or less the entire afternoon and evening since about 3pm or so feeding. I'm absolutely knackered. I thought he might have a nap again just now as I've fed him again and swaddled him but no. He's grumbling in his cotbed again.

Add to that the fact that I did something to my back at some point today. I am in agony whenever I bend over too much or twist my back at all. Which is not good to have when I'm looking after a 12lb eating machine!

I have to go and sort him out again. Jonathan is tired from last night having Robert sleep in bed with us so it's my job today I guess. Just thought I'd let you all know it's gone a bit better today, even though I'm exhausted at the moment and in pain with my back.

Future daughter-in-law to visit today! Almost 7 weeks old

Today, Robert is going to meet his future wife! ;) Our friends' little baby Bethany who is two weeks younger than him (who was supposed to be 5 weeks younger but she came very early for a first baby!) is coming over with them today to see us all which will be lovely.

We've been trying to get photos of Robert's smiles, which he is doing more and more often, but they are still rather sparce. They are so lovely! They're like his big sleep-grins, but they are just so much more precious with his eyes wide open and looking at someone. :) We took a few pictures while he was on his changing mat and downstairs on his activity mat yesterday which might have captured a grin or two, we shall see! They have yet to be sorted through.

For the past week (maybe a bit less, I'm not sure, the nights and days seem to roll into each other), we have been putting Robert down to sleep earlier - around 10.30-midnight, and he's been going down AWAKE, and falling asleep in his cotbed himself! The trick to doing this it seems is to get him so he will be content to lay somewhere without thrashing his arms and legs around, and if we swaddle him, offer him a last feed, and then put him in his cot with his mobile on, he will go to sleep eventually (and in the meanwhile, lay quietly looking at the night light on the mobile). Plus, we can usually get him to go back to sleep for a few hours once he wakes between 3.45-6am for his feed, back until 8-10am. It's after then that his sleeps aren't as well co-ordinated and in his cot, usually. He takes naps sometimes in his bouncey-chair, or on me, but rarely in his cot during the day. It's something to work on, but at least his night-time sleeps are sorted, even though he rarely goes more than 5 hours in a stretch.

Feeding is better too - I've not had to do that thing where I log his feeds and if thye are good ones or not - I can see plainly the majority of his feeds are good and his latches are mostly good - probably about 90% of the time he will latch correctly. I am happy to continue breastfeeding him, although we are also mixing in some bottle feeds of expressed milk as I was last time I mentioned it. It just makes things simpler I feel, and means I can have a break for a few hours if I need it. Although we need to start building up a supply, so breast-milk storage bags are on the wishlist! ;)

Anyway, better go feed the little man, he's just been changed, and had his hair washed so it's all nice and fluffy ready for Bethany's visit (that and he peed all in it earlier).

Hope you're all well! I will try and post pictures next time, if we have any good smiley ones!

Difficult nights - lovely mornings - gorgeous photos!

Sooo... as you can tell I finally got around to writing Robert's birth story. Truth be told it was easier than I thought it would be. I did well up a bit but only towards the end, so I think maybe I am beginning to come to terms with it all. There are so many things on our birth plan that of course we couldn't do due to how he arrived. Jonathan never got to cut the cord. Robert and I got our first skin to skin contact almost 2 weeks after birth, instead of seconds after birth. His vernix was rubbed off. I had the drug to speed up placenta delivery. Etc, etc. But you know what? I don't care about any of that. I don't think I ever did care about any of that. Because at the end of the day, Robert lived. Minutes after his birth when I was standing there, I was sure he wouldn't survive to be an hour old. And here he is, 3 weeks old.

Thank you so much for your comments on the birth story. It never really occured to me how well I did do, or that I went through a lot physically after the birth. I also wasn't aware of how emotional it would make people, especially since I hardly cried at all writing it, I guess because I have had so long to think about it and digest it now. I'm not sure I agree on what people said that there was nothing I could have done differently. Giving birth out of the water and squatting to deliver would have probably done wonders and could well have ended up in him breathing at birth. But I do agree there was no way I was to know what was going to happen, and knowing that, I guess I did the best I could have done under the circumstances. I have come away from this birthing experience not only with the knowledge on how to make any future births I have better, but I also came away with a gorgeous baby boy, and for those two things I am so incredibly grateful.

Robert's sleep overnight lately has been very bad. As such I feel I am at the end of my tether a LOT during the night. The night before last he didn't go to bed until 2am (despite him starting to get sleepy at 11ish). He almost woke at 5am, but then went back to sleep until 7am. Then last night, he was up from about 6.30pm til 12am - slept for HALF AN HOUR... then woke and didn't get back to sleep until 3.30am. And then woke at 7am. I fed and changed him while Jonathan tried to get a bit more sleep - afterall he can't sleep at work whereas I can sleep later if Robert sleeps again. Which luckily he did do - but only in bed with me and as I was so tired from hardly any sleep last night I let him sleep in bed with me. He woke up hungry again after a while, and I tried to feed him a muslin cloth (to suck of course for comfort haha!), but he wasn't really very interested in it. Then as I was quite tired still, I laid down on the bed, and put Robert on my chest. I was horizontal but still, it was more comfortable than sitting up. To my amusement, Robert started rooting, and managed to position his gaping mouth right over my nipple (I was wearing a bra though) and start trying to suck it! So I unclipped my bra, and let him root again, and he managed to attach himself and start feeding away - and with a pretty good latch too! I just lay there, looking at my sweet funny clever man, suckling away, and even though I had got frustrated with him last night when he wouldn't go down to sleep for ages, all of that just melted away.

Jonathan took some absolutely gorgeous photos of Robert the other day as he was laying on the bed sucking on a muslin. They really are good and almost look professional! When I have some free time I am going to print them out on nice photo paper and find some frames to put them in...

This following image just lights up my day, and makes my heart swell. Oh, and makes my milk let down too it seems! Hehe.

Little teeny hands!

We took some photos of Robert by the Christmas tree to send to people in cards this year... and oh my gosh they turned out gorgeous too!

My gorgeous little boy - how I love him so!