EV is teething (possibly?)

We were awoken at 4.30 in the morning, an hour after a feed, by an inconsolable EV. Not interested in feeding, a clean nappy, burping or even a cuddle. No temperature and not too cold.

She finally went off to sleep after some Calpol but here's why I think it might be teething:

Chewing frantically on her hands. Check.
Chewing on my hands. Check.
Chewing on the syringe as I try to feed her calpol. Check.
Drooling her way through several bibs per day. Check.
Pink cheeks. Check. (Although possibly related to our frosty walk? - see yesterday)
Nappy Rash. Check. (Apparantly the two are related. However, her nappy rash alone isn't severe enough to bother her)
Strange new cry. Check.

I am going to buy some bonjela, if I make it out of bed in the morning that is!

EV is twice her size

We went for a frosty walk today. EV was wearing:

1 short sleeved vest,
1 longsleeved t-shirt
1 pair velour dungarees
1 pair knee high socks
1 fleece baby grow (with bunnies on the feet)
1 padded, hooded coat
1 fleece bobble hat
2 fleece mittens
(We couldn't quite fit her bootees over her very padded feet.)

Picture Maggie Simpson in her snow suit, or a starfish.

EV is blowing bubbles

In a word: Messy

It makes me laugh every time but there is baby dribble everywhere! We had a good long conversation this morning, blowing raspberries and bubbles back and forth. Although, I have to say, she beats me hands down where spit bubbles are concerned.

EV is feeling much better

Phew!

She's very sleepy though. Slept for 17 of the last 21hours (ie. since bedtime last night) She slept until 10am this morning!

EV is distraught

One word: immunisations

EV is not a fan and there is only so much Calpol can do. Poor thing looks like she no longer knows who to trust in this cruel cruel world. She has also mastered the mother of all screams and demands to be carried around and cuddled at all times when she is awake.

I took pity on her, and myself, strapped her up in her ring-sling (a lifesaver!) and took her on a walk to the bakers. Bought myself an eclair as a reward for my patience and impending deafness.

EV is squeaking

Obviously, babies don't intuitively know that speaking happens whilst one is breathing out. Not in.

EV makes the most hilarious squeaking/wheezing noise by 'talking' on the in breath in between normal babbles and coos. Prompted myself and Mr. D both to try it and see if it is possible to talk whilst breathing in.

Go on, try it, you know you want to...

EV is having her teeth brushed

Okay, so she hasn't actually got teeth.

When I visited the dentist last week, my private and pricey Dental Hygienist and I had a conversation along the lines of:

He: At baby's bedtime, when you are brushing her teeth...
Me: ??
He: (rather mockingly, I thought) You don't brush her teeth, do you?
Me: (quite defensive) She hasn't got any!
He: {sigh} Well, you still need to brush them...

He went on to explain that it is a good idea to get her used to having the toothbrush in her mouth and that I'll thank him when she's teething because it will help the teeth come through. Well, I'm not one to argue with a dental hygienist, I always feel slightly like a naughty schoolgirl who hasn't done my homework around them, so EV is now having her gums brushed nightly.

Actually, when she's not trying to suck/lick the toothbrush, EV does seem to enjoy it.

EV is a telly addict

I'm not proud of this but there doesn't seem to be much I can do about it!

It's not that we have the telly on all day at home (In fact I make a conscious effort to switch it off when no-one is watching it.) but if it is on, EV will literally try to turn her head and eyes 180 degrees to see it! I suppose the combination of moving lights and noise are irresistible.

Still, I suppose it is almost unavoidable in the culture we live in. I even know one mum who confessed that her child is mesmerised by Jeremy Kyle, apparently it's all the close up head shots, not the tawdry confessions or trailer trash relationships, that he finds so appealing!

So far, I have managed to abstain from children's TV channels. I'm afraid EV is stuck with the rather limited options of Strictly Come Dancing, BBC breakfast and Diagnosis Murder for now. Maybe that'll be enough to put her off TV for life?!

EV is doing crunches

EV can sit upright for a few moments if I pull her up by the hands and hold onto them to help her balance. We quite often play "rowing" up and down,with me holding onto her hands and supporting her wrists, her holding my thumbs as I gently pull her up to sitting and lower her down again.

After we have repeated this a few times over, she tenses her stomach and lifts her head in anticipation. Yesterday I noticed her doing this whilst sat in her bouncy chair, doing a series of mini-crunches as though trying to sit up.

EV is staying with Dad

EV got to stay with dad, on his own, for the morning whilst I got my hair cut (long over due!)

A little selfishly, I thought there might be a few hiccups, I even forgot to defrost the expressed milk beforehand. A good chance for dad to find out how I cope with the feeding/sleeping/crying whilst he is out at work.

Well, the little angel watied patiently for the milk to be defrosted and heated and then went peacefully off to sleep whilst hubby enjoyed a good bath. Returned from the hairdressers to find the dishes done, the kitchen cleaned and the downstairs tidied.

Grrrr.

EV is playing with favourite toys

EV is starting to react differently to different toys. She strokes favourite cuddly toys and she cries when she is bored and wants something to play with or watch.

top 5 toys at the moment are:
1. Zoola Zebra. (Jelly cat) Is it the black and white stripes or her amusing long, rattly legs? I don't know but it's a clear favourite.
2. Winnie the poo mobile. She could watch it all day long, if only I didn't have to keep going back to wind it up.
3. Ribbons. Just a bunch of ribbons I tied together. She watches as they drift towards her, grabs hand fuls of them as they land on her and tugs on them as they drift away again.
4. Doggy. (another jelly cat toy)Sleeps in her moses basket when she has a daytime nap. He got a good cuddling the other day.
5. Raffa, the Giraffe. Cute, cuddley, but confusingly shorter and fatter than Zoola.

EV is having a massage

Went to baby massage classes today, they are free and run by my local health visitor. I didn't think EV would be impressed at first, as she was quite tired. We missed morning nap and so she cried all though the man explaining the techniques. (Cue lots of self conscious pacing around at the back of the class by me trying to settle her).

However, she seemed to really relax and enjoy being massaged. It's mostly firm stroking, rather than pressing or kneading, using lots of long strokes, overlapping hands and clockwise circles. The instructor used sunflower oil, which made me think of deep frying slightly, but it was great because it is absorbed so quickly. Having to lie on her tummy for part of it didn't impress her much (as usual) but otherwise I would say it was a success.

EV is a chatterbox

Chatting away, especially to friends, relatives, visitors, oh, and her mobile oddly.

There are two modes of chatting: Cute Babbling - very cute. usually reponds to questions with ooh and aahs, ewohs or elll-eeees. Generally accompanied by smiling. This type of chatterring seems most prevelant at 3 in the morning, after feeding, when EV is back in her cot and I want her to go to sleep.

Angry Babbling - As above but in EV's best cross voice. Usually happens when her cute babbling is being ignored, or we leave the room whilst she is talking to us!

Today EV would rather lie and chat to her mobile and her fists than nap, despite the fact she is very obviously tired!

EV is feeding, feeding, feeding

Up three times in the night feeding for the last two nights, arrgh. Am SO tired.

It must be the 3 month growth spurt everyone keeps telling me about. Like all the other growth spurts, it consists of frequent and prolonged breastfeeding, around the clock, until the milk production ups itself to meet demand and things settle back down. The single most common reason people give up breastfeeding and apparantly this one takes a little longer than the others.

Wish me luck, and sleep, tonight!

EV is a Kanye West fan

...and Tom Jones and the Bee Jees and the Prodigy!

Eclectic taste, no?

Well, really it's anything she can wave her arms around to or watch her mum and dad dance around stupidly to. A sure fire way to get the dinner cooked and the dishes done without complaints from EV is to dance around the kitchen waving your arms, whilst doing so.

Oddly, she seems to prefer male vocalists.

EV is twirling her hair

Very Cute.

Standard going to sleep pose is now: lying on back, head to one side, one thumb in her mouth, the other hand twirling and stroking her hair at the back.

Awww.

Interestingly, I used to suck my thumb as I went to sleep as a child and my mother-in-law once told me that my hubby used apparantly used to twirl his hair round his fingers when he was tired as a baby! Now there's Genetics in practice!

EV is reaching out

Her dad spotted it first. A deifinite shift from just randomly waving her arms around to reaching fairly steadily towards something she is looking at.

EV has been able to use touch to guide her movements and reliably find parts of her body for a couple of weeks now. Eg. Moving her open palm over her face until her fingers cover her nose and in order to put her thumb in her mouth to suck, or extending this behaviour by putting both hands to her mouth so that they find each other and then playing with her fingers.

However, this is the first time either of us has noticed any visually guided movements, or movements directed at objects outside herself.

EV is going swimming

Baby swimming is amazing! Lots of fun. We go to Puddleducks classes, which are quite pricey but I think they are definitely worth it!

The only trouble is, our class is at lunchtime (which is usually a nap time for EV) so the whole of the rest of Thursday is spent trying to break the pattern, get her to sleep in the morning, feed early and hope she makes it through the 30min session without crying/feeding/sleeping/pooing. (I think the going rate for success is 1 lesson out of 5 so far!) Half an hour must seem like a very long time when you are only 2 months old... equivalent to 2 1/2 days for a 20 year old as a percentage of their life!

Still it's definitely worth it, she loves floating, getting pulled along like a tug boat, watching her mum blowing bubbles and squirting water every where and then there's the submersions. That's the part everyone usually asks me about. They are optional, but EV enjoys it. She comes up looking a bit dazed and confused but not upset and she is still too young to swallow the water or choke (babies have a gagging reflex up to around 6 months). The program teaches babies how to use their reflex through simple behavioural conditioning (think Pavlovs dags, with about the same amount of drool in fact) and hopefully, with plenty of repetition, they keep the reflex instead of growing out of it.

EV is smiling at raspberries!

Found out today that EV will quite reliably grin at me if I blow a big raspberry at her.

BrrBrBrrBrBrBrrrr!

EV is watching goldfish

Inspired by the Let's Play! pages at Johnson's Babycentre, we went to the pet shop today to watch the fish swimming round and round. Not altogether sure what EV made of it, but the fish did get a good staring at. As did I, by the shop assistant who kept coming to see if the mad crazy lady talking to the fish needed any help.

EV is confused by the end of British Summer Time

Who would have thought a baby could be so sesitive to Daylight Savings? Expecially since her mother doesn't have a clue what time of day it is anymore most of the time.

It all started about 3 weeks ago when the clocks went back, EV started wanting to go to sleep at 6.30 instead of 7.30.

On the dot.

And she made sure I knew about it! Anyway, the nights are drawing in and it's getting darker and darker... and EV is sleeping earlier and earlier.

It's just a shame that the dark mornings don't seem to be having the same effect.