Pretty please Zeeeee

Zack is happily recovered from his bronchiolitis, and although Keith had a mild infection, he's kicked it too. Just mummy who's down with the colds and sinusitis. Not sure why, but he had a really aweful night last night. The guessing game starts again... is it teeth ? is it pain ? Just don't know. At 2am though, both mum and dad are saying "Pretty please Zack, please go to sleep! Puhleeeeez."

Woof

Zack is as sick as a dawg. Poor little guy. He's picked up a bug called "Bronchiolitis" and it landed us in A & E last Friday. We were there from 5 - 9pm and we came home with what looks like an asthma pump with a ventilating chamber (altho the registrar did say that he didn't think it would make much of a difference - they'd already administered it without any success). The equipment didn't alleviate any symptoms and we have't had much sleep this week. Keith and I are both starting to come down with it now - sore throat, stuffy head and tearing eyes. Daddy's been working very hard, and mummy feels a bit thin on the ground, resentful and tired. Ah, the joys of parenthood eh ?

Fat Duck Poo

Oh boy! Zack strikes again. My cousin graciously invited us to a celebratory lunch at the world's best restaurant yesterday : The Fat Duck in Bray.
We're sitting down, enjoying a lovely glass of chilled champagne, and I get a whiff of something which smells awfully like Zack. I lean over to see and sure enough, it is oozing out the top of his trousers! In the Fat Duck! Sometimes I think I'm doomed to one exasperating and embarassing moment of fecal revoltingness, after another.

Oh, and by the way, I'm still supporting Pampers nappies. You'd think they'd get some sort of performance appraisal at this time of year ? ! !

competitiveness and discipline

I am soooo not a competitive person, and have relished all these years out of school and university. I never did enjoy all that "lowest common denominator" stuff, it's just so tedious. But here I am, mother of a small, fast-growing son, and all around me is "when did he do that?" and "how much does he weigh?", and "are you back into your pre-pregnancy clothes?". When did this all turn into a competition? I'm just grateful that he's healthy, has all his faculties, everything is where is should be.

I took a break from writing this to go to the loo, where I picked up Waitrose's new mag - Source - and the first article I read tackles exactly this... Fiona Gibson writes ..."Let's be realistic : I'm 41 with a body that's been through two pregnancies, including six-pound twins. It would be unreasonable, surely, to expect my stomach to resemble a slab of MDF. My small cluster of sensible brain cells says,' No, you're not one of the endless bevy of footballers' wives who go skinny-malinky approximately nine seconds after giving birth, and why would you be?..."

Well put sister!

The glaringly omission is how few mothers ask the more important questions, like "How well behaved is your child ?", and "How are you getting on with discipline ?". It does amaze me that in an era of "Super Nanny" and more discipline resources than you can poke a stick at, so few parents tackle this extremely important issue. Yeah, yeah, we're all going to do it differently, but let's face it, if we don't discipline our children, they turn into unholy terrors - unpleasant to be around, they'll get avoided on the birthday party circuit, teacher's will raise their eye-brows when your little angel's name gets mentioned, and (WAKEY WAKEY) your mates are going to be pushed to spend too much time with you, other than at your house where YOUR kids can trash YOUR place. There's a huge knock on here.


I am so grateful to Tim & Jacqui for the delightful Quinton Blake book they gave us before Zack was born : the Zagazoo. Oh, I do hope he turns out to be the delightful young man in 20 years time.

the Gonz is come

(these photos were uploaded 2 days after Alessio was born, so to answer all the questions I've had, Jackie didn't have him at home)

Jackie and Claudio are the proud parents of a baby boy - Alessio - born this evening at 7:10pm ! wonderful news.

and it's crawlin'

We've been rockin', we've been rollin', but we ain't crawled yet....


Until today.



At exactly 15h50 - just as I was about to head out and leave Zee with my mum for an hour, he decided to take his first tentative handprints forward. It wasn't much, altho' we'd been anticipating it, so had camera at the ready. Here it is recorded for posterity (and for dad, in the UK).

closing moments : SA

Our relaxing and sunny holiday in South Africa is drawing to a close. Tomorrow is Monday and that means we have only four days left until departure. Zack continues to grow and progress - all so rapidly it seems. He is grasping more and more carefully (he is such a boy though, and won't do the fine fingered pinching unless his smash and grab technique has failed repeatedly), his "crawling" is coming on well with movement backwards and sideways in both directions. He can also roll forward from seated to crawling position, which means that he can reach for things that were previously out of reach.

He is getting braver with his eating - fruit and veggies are put away with ease, and dad has fed him a potato chip (much to my dismay, but that's life). I have given him a few crusts of bread to gnaw on (again, I'm sad that I capitulated, as I'd hoped to stave it off until 12 months), so our hurdles are now protein, fish in particular, and then dairy in 4 months time. He is a good size though (oh so heavy I'm finding) so he may make the transition sooner - I'll talk to the mates and hear what they say.

He has certainly found his voice, as "shrieking while we play" is now common, and he knows how to "freak out" when he wants something badly enough. Oh, the joys of discipline and learning to say "No" firmly. He thinks "no" is a game sometimes, which defeats the exercise.