Motherhood 23 months on….

So much is changing.  Marley’s comprehension is amazing.  While he’s still not speaking the ‘Queen’s English’, he certainly has a good understanding of it.  The other week I was astonished when I’d asked him ‘Where’s the Mmmmm for Marley?’ referring to his little lap top and he immediately pushed M.  He did the same for J, R, S, A, G and L.  He’s clever!  I was blown away that he was able to identify those letters with little to no coaching from me.  He plays with his lap top in the car and it’s obviously very educational!  Gosh.  Marley’s taken to jumping on our bed as though it’s a trampoline.  A big jump up in the air and legs are thrown forward so that he lands on his bum.  He tried that once on the carpet but didn’t take to it which is a good thing.  The other thing he does is stands up on the bed and does a backwards pin drop type fall landing flat on his back on the lovely soft and bouncy bed...at this stage I’m hoping he doesn’t give that one a try on the carpet. 

It must be almost a month ago that Marley pulled a steaming hot cup of tea onto himself.  It was awful but thankfully he’s healing so well.  While the burns were large blisters of skin immediately, in the end they were superficial burns and are healing quickly. 

Some of the changes…
A couple of times during sleep time he’s started giggling for seemingly no reason, he must’ve been thinking of something funny. 
He gives extremely cheeky looks during dinner, like he’s trying to make us laugh.
He actually took a toy from another child on Tuesday, that’s the first time I’ve ever seen him do that.
He’s a lot more interested in other children than he used to be.
He loves painting, drawing and pasting. 
He’s very very easy to manage and will always settle with a pen and paper.
He knows every scene of his Wiggles dvd’s and has favorite scenes and songs and dvd’s.
He feeds himself totally, he’s done that for a long time but has tended to get lazy at some stage in the meal, now he’s eating whole meals with no encouragement from me.
He LOVES his mum and his dad, loves morning cuddle time and the last couch cuddles before bed.
Has had some successful practice runs on the potty.
He loves to roll everywhere, that’s when he’s not jumping.
He’s constantly hiding and running away from us around the house which always ends in lots of laughter all around.
He loves Sandy our Jack Russell and lets her in and out of the house and tries to ride her like a horse when he thinks no one’s looking.
He can open the car door from the inside of the car.
Loves driving on my lap along the drive way up to aunty Cathie’s bipping the horn all of the way.
Loves it when I play my guitar.
Enjoys dancing SO MUCH!
Positions Tim and my faces so that we’re looking at what he wants us to look at.
Stages us to clap our hands in symphony and resets our hands when we’ve lost interest.

He’s a beautiful beautiful gentle boy with a very cheeky and mischievous streak.  He’s almost 2!!

Motherhood 22 months on….

My baby, my little baby boy is growing tall and lean.  His pot belly is becoming flat and his hands and fingers long.  He jumps and jumps up and down all day long.  He’s so proud of getting both feet off the ground at the same time that he just has to keep jumping over and over again.  He is easily amused by burping sounds thanks to the McD’s baby shrek doll and is repeating some single words and using words whenever and where ever he likes which is fairly rare.  It may be that I just don’t understand him.  He puts his head to the side, follows my face and eyes with his own as if he’s being ultra sincere and just tells me so much stuff that I don’t understand. It’s very funny.  He’s very funny. 

This past month Marley managed to scare the hell out of us on a couple of occasions.  One was when he and I were having a lovely playful morning and he ran after me into the bedroom and tripped and fell face first onto the corner edge of our bed.  This resulted in a 2 hr drive to Canberra and some plastic surgery performed on the space between his nose and his top lip.  It’s healing very very well considering how awful it was and hopefully he won’t scar much at all.  That was one of the most horrible days of my life.  A week or 2 later his left leg just kept giving way on him and he couldn’t walk without falling and was unable to pull himself up to a standing position or to walk up or down steps.  Again, quite frightening especially considering he hadn’t injured his leg at all.  The Dr took it seriously and sent us home with forms for a brain scan should his leg not improve.  Thankfully his leg did improve and he was back to normal the following day. The Dr thought it might have been a virus. 

During this month Marley has developed an aversion to doctors, hospitals, blood tests and even cried when I had one done the other day.  He had nightmares for a couple of weeks after the injury to his face and has become very stand-offish when being examined by the doctor.  All of this but he still managed to dance to the wiggles in his cot at the hospital.  Funny boy.  I sing him a special I love you song before bed now and he really loves it.  We did some artwork with his hand prints and made a mobile of heaps of his hand prints cut out and each time we pass it he has to give it a high five.  He has gone off his food recently, just doesn’t have much of an appetite and is only sleeping for an hour in the afternoons. 

I’ve found that until recently he’s refused to use words that anyone else instigates...eg if you were to say ‘Marley can you say Cathie???’ he’d ignore you.  If you said ‘Marley, can you say pig?’ he snorts like a pig.  The only word Marley will say when you ask him to is CAR.  Car car car car car!!!  I decided this might be a clever way to encourage him to say new words.  I started ‘Marley, can you say Car?’ and he says loudly and proudly ‘CAR’, and so I say ‘can you say TA’ and he says ‘TA’.  .....Marley can you say foot? and he says “SHOE”.  This is very typical of Marley’s use of language.  There is no doubt that he gets his message across though, nomatter what he’s trying to say. Today for example he got sick of trying to tell us something and so he walked to the table and grabbed his cup and then to the kitchen and reached up and grabbed the milk off the bench and poured himself a drink of milk!!!!!!! Tim and I nearly fell over. 

The picture above illustrates what I found him doing in the bathroom the other day when I was hastily packing our bags for a weekend away.  Turn your back, you take a risk is my new motto.

Motherhood 21 months on….

Marley has mastered the English language and as far as he’s concerned we’ve ALL got it wrong.  He is softly spoken and when he’s in the mood he has a lot to say, most of which goes straight over my head.  He understands so much that I find myself constantly shaking my head.  He’s clever but in a quiet achiever kind of way.  The other day he was saying ‘NO’ and shaking his head and I responded “YES” and nodded as I said it.  This went on for a little while before he decided he had the power to change my answer and he took my face in his hands and moved my head side to side and said ‘NO’.  It was so funny, and it wasn’t as though we were actually even debating something, it was just a little disagreement over Yes and No.
He runs so fast now.  Really proper running.  He still practices jumping up and down and manages to lift both of his feet off the ground from time to time.  He steps up steps one foot per step and is very proud of this achievement and he likes to walk up our bodies if we’re silly enough to hold his hands in a front on situation...he’s like a little mountain goat...up he’ll go without hesitation.

His attachment to Tim has really developed a lot recently.  He really does love his Dadda so much (and visa versa).  Nightly Tim and I will discuss how lucky we are to have our little man and how deeply in love we are with him.  Marley actually responds quite emotionally, giving me big juicy kisses and cuddles when I get his attention and do the signs as I say “Mumma LLLLLLOOOOOOVVVVVVESSS Marley”...it makes him melt and his response makes me melt.  He’s just such a beautiful little boy.  He’s gentle, subtle, funny, cheeky, clever, expressive, fast and has a great love for music.  His attention span is tremendous really.  I actually have to switch the tv off if I want him to take any notice of what I say.

A couple of his special gifts are his self assuredness, his ability to run fast and dodge his mum and dad like a speeding bullet, his very cool dancing and his ability to light up a room with very little effort on his part.  I wouldn’t say he’s stand offish but you have to work hard to win him over that’s for sure.  I just think he’s so funny and I’m loving being his mumma and feel so incredibly blessed.

He loves to draw...on pretty much anything....especially his shoes if I’m not looking.  He loves to play with my perfume that’s neatly stacked up on the window ledge in the bathroom.  He is still a big wiggles fan.  The other day I bought him a new wiggles dvd after he’d been such a good boy on our long trip to Victoria and the look on his face, the pleasure on receiving it was amazing!  It was as though I was passing over a the new version of Tomb Raider to a teenager.

Marley came to the gym with me today while I undertook a group training session. He sat in his pusher with a smirk on his face as he watched us all running, boxing, grunting and straining as we pushed ourselves into physical perfection.  He’s such a patient little man and is generally just so easy.  He just makes me laugh more than I can say and I love my boy to bits.

Motherhood 20 months on….

Gosh, I can’t believe Marley’s 20 mths, I suppose that makes him nearly 2!  His development has been put on fast forward this past month and he astounds me every single day with his new found knowledge and his funny quirks.  He is passionate about cars right now.  His first word when he wakes up is “car”.  His language is slowly developing with new words cropping up daily but the biggest area of growth is in his comprehension and communication.  He loves the Wiggles and The Fimbles and while he watches the dvd’s motionless and completely absorbed, he dances along to the Wiggles sound track showing off the new moves he’s learnt from the dvd.  He has picked up heaps from the Wiggles dvd’s and keeps surprising me with his new tricks. 
He’s taken to opening the kitchen cupboards where he can regardless of how often I ask him not to.  It’s like he’s just realised that my words are only words and I’ll love him even if I do get cross and thinks it’s worth the risk, so gets into my cupboards at every opportunity.  It’s obviously not a big problem or I’d have locks on all of the cupboards but it is funny to watch him take the screw driver to the hinges on the Fisher Price playhouse. 
He’s started throwing in some “um’s” into his vocabularly which I have to say sounds really funny.  “Um........ sheiovek nesh feallw car bus, Um.....CAR!” He’s also started with a surprised sounding intake of air every time the phone rings, I get a text message or he see’s anything exciting at all.  He snores each night when we put him down to bed, a nice loud fake “I’m going to sleep” snore which never fails to make us laugh.  He blows us a kiss from his bed and then snores or rather snorts loudlyl
He’s big enough now to stand on the chair in the kitchen and watch as I cook, he loves that and I do too.  He eats pretty much everything I give him including mild curries and pickled onions and olives. 
Today he was determined to add some new work to his latest piece of art that I’ve put on the wall.  He kept climbing up on my desk and grabbing for the pens and I kept taking him down.  Eventually he got a hold of what he was after while I was distracted and he headed straight to his drawing on the wall and started adding dots.  After each dot he would make a little pleased “hmm” sound, like he was a professional artist who was having great satisfaction in the finer details of his work.  He spent a long time working on his drawing and was so careful.  He’s a true Virgo and careful to put the lids back on each of the textas he uses. 
His favorite books now are the Wiggles books and the word books which he usually brings to me and says “CAR” as he points to the picture of the car.  He points out so many things now when I ask him ‘where’s the couch?’, ‘Where’s the duck?’ , ‘Where’s the pencil?’.  He’s gone from seemingly not really knowing for sure to confidently and actively pointing these things out.  He still refuses to say “Ta” but I’m not too worried about that.  Actually he refuses to say lots of words I know that he can say...all at his own pace.
The other night Tim went to put him to bed and I gave him a cuddle and whispered to him “I love you baby” and he whispered back to me “shba shaaaooobbaoo shubba shoo” God we laughed!  When we watch tv and anyone whispers now he starts to whisper too. 
Oh and his latest trick is to stick his finger up my nostril.  He thinks it’s hilarious and he pulls that trick out when you least expect it, and actually, I always laugh, its funny!
He’s also taken to pulling me by the hand to ‘put me’ where he wants me to be which is usually down on the ground so that he can climb all over me.  This usually happens if I’m not paying him enough attention and it’s such a lovely way of saying ‘hey mum, remember me?’, especially considering he could easily go and do something negative to get my attention.  I generally let him lead me where ever he wants me to go and it becomes a lovely little game between us.  I’ve also been running away from him at times which puts him in fits of laughter.
I’m taking great pleasure in learning who this little man is.  Watching him observe and reproduce actions, sounds and behaviours is very funny and heart warming.  He is my baby boy and I just love him SO much.

Motherhood 19 months on….

With fast deep breaths he manages to keep his own conversation going and not allow a word in edgewise....all the time spittle running over his expressive lips and down his chin.  His arms gesticulate madly, pointing, pushing the air sometimes with one hand, often with both as he engages you with his eyes, hands and words.  His own language entirely.  He travels from one activity to another, depositing items of play in the kitchen, under the table, anywhere really.  He tries and tries over and over to lift his feet off the ground in a true jump.  He wears hats only to tip his head upside down in an effort to get them off without using his hands.  He helps himself to the fridge, opens the sliding and front doors of the house, opens the car door, takes his shoes off and drops to the ground when I insist he should hold my hand on an outing.  He slinks away quietly to his bedroom and takes every book off the shelf as he finds the book he wants...he then sits and reads quietly.

He loves his guitar which he plays every day, he also sings along and dances as he plays. 
Marley LOVES the Wiggles, New MacDonalds Farm, Sesame Street and Playschool.  Marley HATES being asked to say TA.  Ask him to say Ta (which he can do) and you’ll see the most hilarious series of physical movements amounting to an attempted tantrum that has me hiding my laughter.  Ask him what a duck says and he’ll snort like a pig, ask him what dog says and he’ll snort like a pig, ask him what a pig says and he’ll snort like a pig.  He absolutely refuses to verbalise any other animal sounds but I’m sure he knows more than he lets on.
He’s cheeky with his mum and dad.  Offers kisses to mum (or dad) and refuses to kiss dad (or mum).  He thinks it’s a wonderful thing to jump on my back at any given opportunity and he clearly understands so much more than before.  He’s able to communicate most of his needs to me through a series of pointing and grunting with a little moan twist.  He actually laughs when I tell him I don’t know what he’s saying, I say “what does ooooooohhhhaaahhhh mean????” and he gets the giggles.  Working with him on packing away, saying Ta and holding my hand when walking in public.

ME, I’m ready to go back to work.  Ideally I’d like 2 days a week and I think Marley would benefit from a child care setting.  I ADORE my baby boy! He’s growing way too fast and I’m longing to hold a new baby to my breast again.  It’s hard to put into words the satisfaction, love, pride, adoration I feel in relation to Marley.  I constantly long to hold and kiss him, to cuddle and tickle him.

hCG levels and pregnancy tests

hCG production starts just a few days after conception, before implantation in the uterus and enters the mother’s circulation almost immediately after implantation of the embyo (blastocyst) which typically occurs 7-10 days after ovulation.  The tiny amount of hCG that enters the mother’s circulation at implantation (<5mlU/ml in blood) is too small to be detected by pregnancy tests but is sufficient to stimulate the corpus luteum of the ovary to produce progesterone. 

The concentration of hCG in the circulation rises exponentially, doubling every 2-3 days.  By the first day of a missed period the average hCG level is about 100mlU/ml but there is a big variation in hCG levels at this time with normal levels ranging from 5-450mlU/ml in blood samples.  hCG can also be produced by early pregnancy loss or pregnancies that fail to implant properly.  It is suggested to wait 3 days after missing a period when results will be clearer. 

hCG reaches it's peak in about the 10th week of pregnancy at which time the extremes of normal levels are approximately 5000 to 150,000 mlU/ml.  In the next 10 weeks hCG levels decline with a wide variation in concentrations ranging from 2,000 to 50,000 mlU/ml and remain at this concentration until term.  hCG levels are 30-50% higher in twin and multiple gestations. 

These are the facts, but the emotions associated with trying to conceive, pregnancy and testing are a completely different thing. 
It is advisable to wait until AF is due or overdue to test but it’s near impossible to wait when you know that the outcome makes the world of difference to you.  People test early for different reasons.  To confirm what they believe to be true or hope to be true or like me, to be let down gently and to get my head around the inevitability of a negative result or the arrival of my period.  I don’t think there’s any right or easy way to approach the issue of testing but it’s important to keep the facts in mind. 

If your hCG levels are too low tests will not pick up on your pregnancy.  False negative’s are very common and can cause a great deal of disappointment.  Tests should be read within the given time frame and not after.  Line’s that appear after the testing time frame (evaporation lines) are not considered positive despite sometimes looking undeniably positive.  This can be very frustrating and terribly disappointing.  Always follow the manufacturers directions and because hCG levels are highest in first morning urine, you’re best to test then, especially if testing early. 

Although most tests claim to be 99% accurate, comparisons between tests and their sensitivity levels as opposed to their claimed sensitivity level differ and should be taken into consideration. 
Discuss this along with your experiences in the forums.

Motherhood 18 months on….

I can’t quite believe Marley’s a year and a half old!
He’s changing and growing so quickly.  I find myself scrambling to record new developments on a daily basis. 

You know that tingly feeling in your hands when you walk bare foot on a tin roof from quite a high peak? I have memories of hot corrugated iron that’s kind of dusty and my bare feet sliding.... WELL, back to the point, that’s what happens to my hands when I pick Marley up these days and I’m not joking.  He wriggles so much and slides out of my arms so easily that my hands tingle.  He straightens out his body, arms up in the air and wriggles to the point where he literally slides through my arms! He does this whenever I pick him up to do some task, like bath, eat, sleep.  He actually thinks it’s all part of a game and is just the icing on the cake after the big chase around the table, through the chair legs and behind the couch.  He is the most difficult child to pick up these days.  I’ve got to the point where it’s easier for me to hang him by his feet for our short walks to change his nappy. 

This past week Marley has blown me away on a couple of occasions.  Firstly he’s started saying “Go car” and I suspect he’s trying to say I love you but it sounds more like “e- o -ooh” and is generally said while he cuddles me and pats my back and usually after I’ve just said ‘I love you’.  Also, the other day as Tim and I stood by Marley who was lying on the change table, I told Tim that that day we’d seen another baby of the same age as Marley who responded with great big waves and blew smoochy kisses to us when his mum told him to.  I was laughing with Tim about how Marley just stood there looking at this child with a blank expression.  Just as I said that Marley’s not blowing kisses yet Marley smooched his hand rather loudly and blew us a kiss!  Tim thought I was setting him up and that Marley had been blowing kisses before this time but honestly he hadn’t and he’d decided to surprise us both, and just to be sure we knew he was well and truly capable, he blew us another kiss.  Tim and I laughed so much!

Another change is that if Marley’s teddy ‘Minty’ is not in his cot when he goes to bed Marley usually cries while I go to retrieve him.  NOW, if Minty’s not there, I say “Minty...where are you?  where’s Minty?” and I continue this kind of banter until I deliver him to Marley who is laughing his head off by this point.  It’s like he understands now that the wait is ok and he trusts that I’m going to get Minty for him and he actually takes pleasure in the process of search and rescue that he gets to hear taking place from his bedroom.

As a mum I suppose I’m just filled to the brim with pride as our little boy’s personality unfolds.  Each and every month I think that this is the best time and all I can say is that if it continues like this I’ll never want him to leave home. 

Preparing for pregnancy

I would say that deciding to have a baby is one of the most monumental decisions a couple can make.  One of the first things I did when we decided to start trying for our baby was went searching for information about this whole new world we were about to embark on.  It’s amazing how little we know about our fertility until we come to face it.  I’ve compiled a ‘to do’ list covering some of the issues relating to pregnancy and conception for those of you who are interested. 

PHYSICALLY
Ideally couples should allow 3 months to prepare their bodies for conception.  Both men and women’s health will affect the chances of conception which can take up to 12 months for a healthy fertile couple. 

WOMEN’S HEALTH
Blood tests for Rubella immunity and a check up with your doctor is highly recommended in preparation for pregnancy.  Discuss with your doctor any medications you are on to determine their safety in pregnancy. 

MEN’S HEALTH
Sperm take 3 months in the making and so what men do now will effect the quality of their sperm in 3 months time.  Sperm can be effected by overheating, bike riding, hot baths, marijuana, cigarettes and stress to name a few.  Zinc is recommended for men who are trying to conceive.  Once again a healthy diet can help to improve sperm quality. 

NUTRITION
Women should be taking at least 500 microgram of folic acid daily, preferably 3 months prior to conception or as soon as she is aware she’s pregnant.  Folic acid helps to prevent neural tube defects, such as spina bifida, in your baby. Some women, for example, those with a family history of neural tube defects my need a higher dose (usually 5 milligram daily) and should consult their doctor.

Along with following a healthy diet including proteins, fruits and vegetables, women should take pre-pregnancy multivitamins.  Its important to take multivitamins specifically relating to pregnancy to avoid high doses of Vitamin A which is not recommended in pregnancy. Pregnancy formulas will usually also contain the required dose of folic acid, so taking a separate folic acid supplement may not be required. Also, some herbal ingredients found in many general women’s vitamin supplements may not be suitable to use during pregnancy.

In pregnancy women should avoid foods which may carry a bacteria known as Lysteria which can be dangerous to your unborn child.  These foods include…
Shellfish
Uncooked eggs
Uncooked meats
Soft cheeses

Also not recommended in pregnancy
Smoking
Alcohol
and Caffeine.

WEIGHT
Being over or under weight can have ill effects of your ability to conceive.  In both cases a woman’s ability to ovulate may be affected.  Doctors recommend that both men and women are within their healthy weight range.  A healthy weight gain in pregnancy (usually up to around 13kgs) is also recommended.

FINANCIALLY
Having a baby is opening a whole new world of expenses, not just hospital expenses, but on going maintenance and educational costs.  Whether considering your first or last child, your new addition will subtract from your bank balance. 

Issues to consider include-

Space- Is your house big enough for a/another child? While they are babies you can get away with having them in your bedroom but do you have a financial plan to incorporate their growth?

Nursery Equipment.
Childcare, working mums, going onto a sole income.
Health insurance/Medical.
What financial support will your receive from the government?

EMOTIONAL WELLBEING
Lifestyle- having a baby will dramatically effect your lifestyle.  Consider if you are ready to give up your freedom to come and go on a whim.  Having a baby won’t just affect your social freedom but also your financial freedom. 

RELATIONSHIP
Is your relationship stable enough to weather the sleepless nights and possible jealousy issues of having a baby?  While having a baby with your life partner can be one of life’s most fulfilling experiences, it can also add stress to your relationship.  Consider if you’re having a baby to share your love or to secure your relationship.  Have you and your partner had enough time to grow together. 

These little people we’re bringing into the world pack a powerful punch and setting yourself up to cater for them and all that they bring would never be enough to prepare a new parent for the change to come but is a very good thing to do. 

GOOD LUCK!!!

Discuss this in our forums

Full cream and Fertile

I’m medicating myself in order to boost my oestrogen levels.  OK well medicating is probably a loose term to use but according to a study conducted by Dr. Jorge Chavarro, M.D., Sc.D. and his colleagues of the Harvard School of Public Health this delicious bowl of ice-cream might just be the key to my fertility issues. 

They say that ‘Women who eat ice cream and drink whole-fat rich milk have a better chance of becoming pregnant’.  Actually I’m waiting for someone to say that this is a joke and found myself wondering if it was the 1st of April but no, it’s a serious , very reliable and well founded study involving 14,000 women. 

They suggest that women who are looking to avoid pregnancy should eat low-fat ice cream and drink skim milk, the opposite diet of women who want to become pregnant.
Researchers found that women who ate two or more portions of low-fat dairy foods a day increased their risk of ovulation-related infertility by 85%, compared with women who ate less than one portion a week.  Dr. Chavarro explained that if women ate at least one portion of high-fat dairy food a day, their risk of anovulatory infertility was 27% lower compared with women who had one high-fat dairy serving a week, or even less.

Obviously it doesn’t mean that we should all go and abandon our sensibilities, your calorie intake shouldn’t be greater than your normal healthy intake but this study certainly has my interest.  When you consider how little we understand about our hormones and the intricacies of the reproductive process, it’s easy for me to imagine how something as simple as oestrogen in foods or lack there of could effect the complicated hormonal synchronicity that occurs throughout the cycle.  Read the study.

Motherhood 17 months on.

This post is overdue because we’ve been away and Marley’s developed so much recently that I needed to give this post quite a bit of time...to gather my thoughts.
I’m having more fun with Marley than ever before but having more trouble as well.  He commonly hits his head as he throws himself backward in tantrums over the smallest of things.  Actually, I don’t think they’re tantrums at all, I think that he’s just trying out how it feels to ‘chuck one’ and is most impressed that his body has the ability to run riot at these times.  I think he’s in awe of his flinging arms and legs and his wonderfully hard head that kind of hurts him when he hits it, hurts but is more surprising than painful, plus it has the added bonus of bringing eye contact from mum and dad.  He’s becoming quite good at the tantrums but is having to work out spacial issues...you see, he doesn’t actually WANT to hurt himself, especially if he doesn’t get any attention for it in the end but he does want the drama.  Yesterday he was sitting on his baby couch with it’s back against the brick wall and I went to pick him up and he didn’t feel like it and so he through his head back and CRACK! Ooh, that was a surprise.  I think as he perfects the technique he’ll learn to be more careful about where he throws his head back or kicks his legs.

Marley has started patting my back when giving me cuddles, the other day I gave him his teddy and he cuddled and patted teddy’s back.  He’s identifying nose, ears, chin, mouth, head, hair, toes and tummy now.  I’ve suspected he’s known this stuff for a little while but he’s not been prepared to disclose what he does and doesn’t know, it’s like he’s just been keeping stuff up his baby sleeve to surprise me with later on.  He calls the cockatoo with some great “aahhhh ahhhhh ahhhhhhhhh’’s that he MAY have witnessed his mother perform from time to time.  Has started saying single words like ‘car’, ‘go’ and today he repeated me when I said “you’re SO SILLY”.  He said “so silly” 4 times in a row and has since completely denied ever doing so.  He snorts whenever he see’s a pig and sniffs when he hears the word or sees a flower.  He drinks out of a cup without a lid now and is down to just one big milk a day.  He brings me books to read and toys he needs help with.  He has also started pulling me by the hand to get things and has helped himself to zooper doopers in the freezer on more than one occassion!  He gives me wonderful kisses, cuddles and Eskimo kisses that nearly break my boney old nose.  He’s also showing signs of having memories of situations, like for example, today he stood at the window calling the Cockatoos when I haven’t done that for at least a couple of weeks.  He anticipates song actions and is very responsive to music.  He loves television and enjoys the joke we play on him when we put our faces in his way so that he has to acknowledge us.  This makes him laugh as he strains to see the teev.  He looks at me when ever his favorite add comes on telly, like as if to say, HEY, here’s that really cool add again.  He claps his hands when we watch Dr Phil and the audience applauds.  Oh also he ‘brooms’ as he plays with cars and he now brings his sore bumps to be kissed better.  So cute!

Physically he’s running, reaching, climbing, walks sideways, backwards, on tiptoes, rides a push along motorbike, can’t quite go forward in his little tikes coupe yet, and is trying to jump.  He kicks and throws balls and has become very active.  He’s able to feed himself now and uses the pincer grasp when drawing.  His shape has changed from chubby baby to a thinner more lengthy toddler.  He pulls the most hilarious faces and spends a lot of time in whinge mode but is more practising the whinge than actually whinging.  He makes me a laugh SO much!  As a mum I’m loving this time when he gives me little bites of new aspects of his personality and his sense of humour.  He’s absolutely gorgeous and very very cuddly.  I can’t wait to have another little baby, a sibling for Marley and another little soul to get to know.

Been offline but all is fine!

OK, huge apologies to those of you who’ve been inconvenienced by UTD being offline.  This has been caused by a change to a new server.  There have been issues with Chat and UTD being accessible but since he’s been home Tim’s been chained to his desk wearing one of those tubey beer hats full of red bull and has been working his little arse off to sort it all out.  Hopefully it’s all been resolved now but we need your help.  Please contact Tim (you can do that here)if there’re any further problems.  Actually if you’re online now, please pop into chat so that we can make sure it’s set up properly.  Thanks Duffers.

System Down until after 12.30

Sorry Duffers but Tim our little Duffer elf has been working a the Duff machinery over night in an effort to make this a better place and has tweeked something he forgot to untweek and has ended up going off to work and leaving me with a site that wont’ load properly! I’ve called him and he says it’s too complicated to explain over the phone (given his work restrictions) and he’ll be home at 12pm and will get straight onto it.  So it’s the morning offline I’m afraid.
Good news from Missy though, she’s got 10 big fat lovely eggs and 12 smaller ones!! Let’s hope this cycle is the one for her.

It would seem that chat is working still.

Our story

UTD is a community.  It all began when Tim gave me this weblog for my birthday in April 2004.  It was the same month we were ttc for the first time in our 11 years of marriage.  5 months before I began to delve into the unknown world of women and fertility online.  It felt like I was stepping into a new universe.  A place where people let their guard down, opened their hearts, abandoned barriers that had been held up to ward nosey others who wanted to cajole you into parenthood.  I felt a sense of freedom, of sharing a great inner secret that YES I did want to have a baby, a secret I wouldn’t share with my family until I was pregnant.  After years of waving off their suggestions I should have a baby, I wanted to do it when it felt right for me.  I wanted it to be my idea, no one else’s.  I wanted to grow and live and learn and love with Tim before throwing myself into motherhood.  That was what I knew was right for me.  I’d never walked into a baby store out of interest, didn’t pour over baby images, had no friends with babies. I was an aunt to 45 and a child carer.  I knew about children, babies, the responsibilities, how they can take away your youth.  Online I met women just like me.  Women who were in shock that their body’s were messing with them and making them act unusually. Making them go all gushy at the sight of a baby, making them imagine what it’d be like to be a mother, making them hope for a baby.  Some women I met were young, some older, not many older than me.  I found that I could relate to women of all different backgrounds, different professions, some already mothers, all aching to be.  We shared the common bond that we desperately wanted to have children.

The girls came with me making this little blog into a community of very different but somehow like minded women who have become individually wealths of knowledge.  I have made friendships I wouldn’t have imagined possible online and receive more support from the Duffer girls than from any of my IRL friends or family combined.  I share with them silly things that no one else would care to comment on or know about, things that I’d be too embarrassed to say out loud and they support me.  They understand what I’m feeling because they’ve felt it.  They care to check up on me and yet there’re no expectations from any of us.  Anyone would wonder how it is possible to transfix on small details like a temperature chart or tingly nipples, but that’s the thing, the girls understand that these small signals could indicate how close you are to your dreams and they treat them with respect, with all of the interest of a best friend.

So that’s what this place has become.  A group of friends who go through day to day joys, tears, disappointments and deep sadness.  One of our friends has lost her baby.  This has happened before and it will happen again.  We all ache for her in her loss and just want to make her feel better.  It feels like UTD is in mourning.  I know that many of us have cried and wonder how we can help.  Anyone not involved in our community might wonder how we could be so deeply saddened by the pain of a woman we’ve never met in real life, but that’s just it.  The relationships become so intense because what is written comes straight from the heart.  Each woman here takes risks to share information they wouldn’t share in real life.  The barriers are removed and you’re left with the truth.  We share immense joy and it’s much easier to move on from, even take for granted but the pain, sadness and desperation we share in our lives leaves a mark and etches itself into this little community.  Let us never forget the babies that have become angels and the pain that the families have suffered.  Remembering it helps us to appreciate the joy that comes everyday.

Thank you to all of my Duffer friends, you really do mean so much to me.

Nikki

Motherhood 16 months on…

We heard a bump 30 minutes after putting Marley into his cot, heard a cry, went to look and were greeted at the doorway by Marley.  He’d escaped from his cot!  That was exciting....for him.  It was quiet, no noise at all.  I went investigating and found Marley playing with my lipstick in the bathroom.  I went outside to put some clothes out and came heard a thumping unusual sound, came back in to find Marley sitting in the middle of the dining room table playing with the salt and pepper.  Tantrums ahoy! He has some pre tantrum stances that are meant to be very serious but just tickle my sense of humour.  1st he spreads his legs in a scarecrow position, this is to indicate a dispute is underway.  Next (depending on how the situation’s been handled) he places his head on the ground and legs still straight but usually feet are heading back together at this point.  Arms somewhere near his head and knees definitely off the ground for this position to have greatest impact.  Then he drops dramatically to the ground to be able to see your response.  I walk away and he drags himself up and comes after me.  He had one trantrum after I took the make up off him that lasted so long that I thought he might’ve been having an allergic reaction to the make-up. 
He’s gone off food.  Just simply not interested in eating much at all.  He’s a lazy eater too, prefers to be spoon fed.  He tends to ignore ,throw or smudge his finger foods into a pulp unless it’s mango which he happily eats. I give him his spoon, he gives his plate a tokin stab and spends a lot of time with an empty spoon in his mouth rather than food.  Drives me to distraction.  I just keep reminding myself that he won’t starve and he won’t go to school unable to feed himself. 
My little man is a dancing machine.  He just loves to boogie and has perfected the strapped to any spot dance.  It truly doesn’t matter where he is, in the car, in his high chair, pusher, he gets his shoulders and upper body moving to pretty much any music he hears.  He likes singing too.  I had some of my own music playing yesterday, we were both singing at the top of our voices, it was very funny.
Marley knows a lot more than he lets on.  I find it next to impossible to test his knowledge.  Most kids you say, where’s your nose and they look blankly or they point or look to either your nose or theirs.  Marley disregards my question and starts his own game of exploring my face at his own pace.  I know he knows the answer because I’ve caught him out a few times.  He is saying words at his own pace also.  Says “UP” now and throws his arms in the air as he says it.  Says “Children” pointing to a picture of children and says “hello” but do you think I can get him to say “duck”? NOPE!  He does snort like a pig though. I’m sure he knows a lot more than he indicates because of the other connections he makes in day to day life but it seems that everything he chooses to express is solely at his pace.  No encouragement necessary or required.
He went through another horrible no kisses for mum stage but he’s over that and in fact loves over kissing.  Lots and lots of slobbery kisses are the new favorite.  I’m not complaining.  The more the better I say

Time for reflection.

I’ve just had a wonderful read of my old ttc journals.  I went over the old emotions from that time and I really do think that I’ve had it much easier this time around...up until this point.  My cycles were all over the place, I was quite obsessed with ttc and I had no clue that I might ever be able to have a baby.  This time I’ve approached the whole process of conception with a much more relaxed attitude, but with that relaxed approach has come complacency.  I’ve not been as obsessive about my alcohol, caffeine and general nutrient intake and that just may be why it’s taking me so long to conceive.  I have been trying now for 9 months and I’m going into the 10th month armed with knowledge.
I’ve had to go searching for information that I myself had written while ttc the first time around and I’m glad to say that I’ve got some real inspiration from my own articles!  So for anyone looking at information regarding trying to conceive check out the archives of this blog.