Sproglet

( No captions, just chucking these up for now )

( A day out at the park with Mum and Dad! )

Gosh, I'm terrible at updating this. I suppose that's because I spend all day in Mum Mode so when Leo hits the sack I indulge myself in other things.

( But, enough about me! )

( 4-6 months progress report sir! )

I forgot to mention that Leo spends all his time in his carseat staring out of the window now, which is cute because he used to just scream loads and require constant singingto/ face pulling. Now he isn't interested in me anymore, but the stuff outside.

( Stuff he does now.. )

( Silly Daddy pictures in Nana's livingroom )

Leo's first Christmas and New Year have been pretty good! Leo was spoiled rotten by the whole family, and seem to enjoy it as much as a 5 momth old can, just looking at everything and trying to eat everybody's presents and fingers.

He's doing stuff so fast I can't keep up. He loves standing up on the sofa holding himself up on the back of it. He bounces around in his doorbouncer like a frigging cybergoth, and can turn round in it when you call him, whereas before he would just rotate with the breeze. He is doing really well with his sitting up, balance and play with a toy like that for about a minute til he gets annoyed, or sooner when he loses balance and topples over.

I am trying to teach him to fall. There is going to be a lot of tumbles on the way so I'm trying to make them fun instead of an annoying defeat for him. Everytime he falls/ topples and looks dismayed I do really over the top enthusiatic 'woops' and smile at him and he just grins back and tries again.

He loves lying in his cot to play with his kicking keyboard thing and look at the mobile that I got him from Ikea, but he still won't bloody sleep in it! Co-sleeping wasn't working for us anymore though, everyone was irratable and sweaty, so tonight I've put the bedguard on the spare bed, and he's been in there sleeping peacefully since about 8. I go in and lay with him to feed him, then he goes back to sleep and I can do whatever I like instead of tiptoeing round my bedroom all night and waking him up anyway. I kindof miss cuddling him though, maybe I'll sneak him into bed in the morning. I figure that once he's sleeping through the night with no feeds I'll try and get him to go to sleep by himself in his cot. At the moment its just too disruptive getting up 4 times a night and stressing us both out when he inevitably gets disturbed and awoken by me picking him up and putting him in the cot. I see this as a compromise/transition, at least he's in his own room without me and not waking up crying because I'm not there.

We also hit a rut with trying to feed him puree. If I feed him in the morning, he wakes up having a cack at 4am. I've tried feeding him at about 4 in the evening but he just arses about, fights me and just sucks his own empty spoon. I suppose I'll have to catch him at about 1 or 2 instead, which will be hard because that's usually when I'm busy.

He's also grown without me noticing and is in his next size clothes. How the hell did that happen?

Well, as Ross reported, Leo is now rolling over easily, both ways. This milestone was the beginning of the 'Not being able to take your eyes off him for 3 seconds' phase, which will last about 5 years. *Groan* I discovered this when I was carrying him on my hip, walking round the kitchen making myself a sanwich. The next thing I know, he's gleefully waving a bottle of fairy liquid about, which he had swiped from bedide the sink. Lucky I managed to grab it off him before he ingested any, but it made me realise that he's losing his baby spazziness. Until this week there was a slight warning period of his little hands flailing in the general direction of whatever it was he was after. No more. He now confidently and without hestitation grabs anything within reach. Plates, eyeballs, bottom lips, hair, glasses of water, ANYTHING.

I am also beginning to hoover obsessively as anything he does grab goes straight into his mouth. I was horrified at the thought of him getting hold of one of my post-baby moulting hairballs and having to make him hack it up like a cat.

He can pass stuff from one hand to the other but it takes a bitof concentration most of the time.

He's been fighting off a sniffly cold this week so I gave the baby rice/ pureed carrot and boob milk a rest until he's over it. It's fun feeding him with a spoon though, I got some disgusting/adorable pictures of him grabbing Ross' hand to bring the spoon to him and slurping the mush off it and getting it all over his face.

Settling him for bed is less of a nightmare now. He still needs cuddling to sleep but I don't have a problem with that. It's kind of nice to have a winding down period together. I dno;t feel confortable leaving him to cry in his cot, it might be seen as spoiling him by parents who used controlled crying successfully on their kids but my Motherly Instincts don't agree with it. Me, my Mum (with Grace) and My Dad (With Callum) all 'attach parent' which I didn't know was a technical way of doing it until recently, but basically involves giving your kid loads of love and hugs instead of forcing them to be indipendent when they dont seem ready for it. Hopefully this will biuld a secure trusting relationship between parent and kid. Awwww.

So anyway. He generally goes to bed between 7 and 8 which is heavenly, I remember the days when he would be crabby for hours before finally setlling (after pacing him around for an hour to music) at about 10.30. It was exhausting. This time of night would be the one I dreaded, but now it's relaxing and time for reading/updating/Quality Time/ getting ready to go out/watching a film etc. He still wakes up for feeds but it isn't a problem as he goes straight back to sleep afterwards. Bliss.

( Loads of pictures of stuff Leo has been dooning for the past couple of weeks )

Right, this is dad reporting from baby central; Leo has, within the last 10 minutes, learned how to roll over from his back to his front. This was to the delight of Danni and me, however, this does mean that he can't be left to sleep on a bed without a guard anymore as he might fall and hurt his baby bonce. He has also eaten loads of sticky baby rice (or more specifically, got loads of baby rice everywhere and a bit went in his mouth), this was pretty good fun but as soon as the camera came out sure enough the smiles vanished. Nevermind.

The new ability to roll has led to difficulties in changing Leo and geting him dressed. Because he's on his back he wants to roll and so he fights with whoever is changing him, then he has a good ol' scream because he inevitably lost.

His grabbing of things has gone to the heady hights (no pun intended) of getting clumps of my hair, he trapped me in bed today by doing this; we were doing aeroplane belly raspberries and on one pass he grabbed the hair in question, I couldn't get to his hands because I was holding his weight off of my head. I was rescued about a minute later. Leo smiled.

Nana Carol has been entertaining him with over exagerated Incy Wincy Spider, she does all the actions and Leo is fascinated to the point of if she stops he complains at the top of his lungs. She is brillient at holding his attention while Danni does other things around the house. Danni and Leo are both very lucky to have her.

Leo is sucking mush off a spoon! He has seemed to enjoy his last three helpings of baby rice mixed with boob milk, and polished them off quite nicely. After some initial gurning and 'bleh' type actions, he got the hang of it and Ross even had a go at feeding him, which was totally adorable, and successful I might add. A relief indeed, I'm the only one who has fed him for the past 4 months and it's nice to let Daddy have a go!

I was looking totally sexy today, mashing carrot and squishing it into ice cube trays to the tune of The Donnas. Oh and squirting boob milk direct from the udder into the bowl to mix with his rice, ahaha.

We're taking Leo swimming on Sunday, which I think he'll enjoy seeing as he's been enthusiastically launching himself into various splishing swimming positions in the bath with me recently.

What else? Oh, he likes belly time now seeing as he can do more stuff instead of just squooshing his face into the carpet. He rolled over a couple of times, accidentally when the weight of his massive baby head changed his centre of gravity while he was wobbling about. He does it intermittently but hasn't quite mastered contol of it yet. He seems pretty close to getting from back to front, he just needs that extra push to get all the way.

One thing he HAS mastered is his door bouncer! He goes mad, dancing all over the place. He's shouting and experimenting with his voice loads at the moment aswell. Still sticking his tongue out loads. He's also almost a total expert at grabbing stuff now, bottom lips and stray bits of hair included, ouch.

His cry has changed too, he does this angry shouty cry which sounds like a toddler having a paddy, it's really goddamn loud at 6 in the morning, he's been keeping some odd hours recently, much to our despair. There's a nack to putting him down, you have to keep a hand firmly on him and sometimes breathe into his ear til he relaxes!

Watching him and Grace together is amazing, they stare at each other, reach out and smile at each other and do little baby babbly noises together. Until one of them gets cranky anyway. It's going to be pretty crazy seeing my son and my sister grow up together.

One more thing! He nips and kneads me when I'm feeding/cuddling him and it bloody hurts so I asked Ross to get me a necklace suitable for wearing solely for the purpose of keeping Leo's hands occupied. He did, and it was ON ELASTIC. Yeah, I'll just be twanged to death instead, cheers. Retard.

Poor Baby! Last night he was up loads, temperature, sounding sorry for himself. I'm really glad Ross was here, for some reason Leo was settling with him better. So at 3 in the morning when he would only let Ross hold him, I was like 'See what it's like being the only one who can settle him?' He groggily grunted a noise which I hope singnalled understanding. It's hard. I had to walk to the park next to my house the other night and have a cig (well more like ahalf, I just needed to get out of the house and sit in the cold in my undies/ fur coat and look at the stars and the cartoon yellow cresent moon) because I'd just been permanently attatched to him all day and I was going mad. I was starving hungry and Leo wouldn't let me put him down and I was just exhausted. I felt better after a 5 minute break but when I came back Leo was screaming his head off in his cot while Ross sat looking helpless and sad. Sometimes I regret breastfeeding, it makes the baby so clingy that no one else can help you out much. Most of the time I'm thrilled I chose it but every now and then I just get so tired and weary...

We had to force some Calpol down the poor kid, which sorted him out eventually. He hasn't been himself today but he' been practicing his shouting loads!

It's bizarre talking to both my mum and my Dad about baby stuff. It's going to be cool seeing Leo and Grace grow up together though. Tonight I was discussing modern pparenting techniques with my Dad, and how his parents are always trying to get things done their way. My Nana being one of them, I know all about that! 'Get them on a strict routine, give them a dummy, bottlefed is better, let them cry it out, don't spoil him' etc. Then theres the new way of doing it, which is to basically let your baby dictate to you what's going to happen. Which works for some things but not others. Surely there's a happy medium somewhere? Sometimes I think parenting lessons should be mandatory ; learning for yourself is fine too and gives you a nice sense of accomplishment but the trial and error, and feeling totally clueless at times is difficult. Self education (internet, books) is all well and good until you realise there's a million different opinions on how children should be raised. So all you can really do is figure it out yourself.

Seeing Ross get more competent is nice. Once upon a time he wouldn't even change a nappy. Now he's well aquainted with stealth nappy changing and all aspects of baby poo. Leo crapped on him when I went out to the Crown last week, screamed for 2 hours and finally fell asleep on his bare chest. I hope that made him understand what hard work I do when he isn't about, but I suspect he probably just thinks he should have got a medal for babysiting that long, haha.

I'm alone tonight so I hope Leo is a bit better. He's asleep at the moment but we'll just have to wait and see.

I'm walking round with a bib down one boob and a sock down the other. I've run out of boob pads and unfortunately I can't switch my udders off.

Leo is upset and grumpy this evening, he just had his last injections and is not a happy bunny. The good news is he seems to want to go to bed for the night around 7 now, woohoo! And he wakes up at 7 in the morning, not bad at all. The bad news is he has finally developed 'Bad timing sense' where he wakes up crying if any hint of intimiacy might be occuring. Little sod, I thought I was lucky but no! Dammit.

You don't need to tickle him anymore to get a laugh out of him, just do stupid voices and waggle cookie monster at him a bit. It's too cute, totally addictive. It's a good job he gets bored after a while or I'd get nothing done all day.

Just tonight he started playing with the water in the bath instead of just laying there and chewing his hands, and maybe splashing with his legs a bit.

CRISPYBAG!I used my new sewing machine to make him something! Whee. He really loves crisp packets, you can't eat a bag of crisps if he's anywhere near because he just grabs it and mangles it, he loves the sound it makes and being able to squish it all over. But obviously crisp packets have sharp adges and possibly toxic deforming dyes to colour them (this particular packet was prawn cocktail luminouspink). So I bought some waterproof/droolproof froggie material and made a velcro closing bag to put the crisp packet it. Ta daa! He loves it. While other children will have battered teddies as mementos of their babyhood, Leo will have a raggedy crisp packet. Yeeha.

He's getting more stable at sitting and stuff too. A few weeks ago you had to hold him firmly with both hands at all times or he's randomly spazz out and a muscle he didn't know he had would excersize itself and he would zoom off in a random direction. Now you can pretty much stabilise him with one hand (unless he's tired or pissed off) and he's only a tinsy bit wobbly.

Oh and he's learning to stick his tongue out in response to someone else doing it! It's so funny watching him gurning.

Much to my relief, he is being less difficult when out and about. Hw was an angel in Ikea, just looking about at stuff and then going to sleep in his sling. He is also not so annoyed about being strapped in his carseat since he found things to look at out of the window!

He totally beats me up in the morning though! I have to cut his nails all the time cos he's damn strong. He boots me and slaps me in the face, or just rams his fist in my mouth to wake me up in the morning. Smiling of course, so I forgive him. But I have bruises, ow.

( Some cheesy pics with Daddy, and Aliensprog )

I take loads of photos, it's just getting them up that's a twat. Leo went in his bouncy hanger thing for ages today, he was dancing all over the place, it was hilairious. He was concentrating so much he wouldn't smile, just like he does when he plays with his feet. I got the camera out this evening too, and he wouldn't stop staring at it. I wanted some shots of us playing together but he just won't look at me when the camera is around!

I ran the bath really depthis evening and got in with him and made him kick around and splash. We're going to start taking him swimming when his immunisations are finished and the last thing I want is for us to get there and him to turn into one of those screaming kids who act like they're dying if they touch water.

He's about one big last push away from going rolling everywhere. He gets around quite a bit with a combination of kicks and half rolls, slightly like that bit in Grease at the dance competition where Danny gets on the floor on his side and 'walks' round in a circle. Yep, like that.

He's bloeing raspberries when he remebers how to do them, which is about 3 times a day. He has quite good conversations with my Gran, rambling and squealing every now and again.

He's also started getting all shouty when he's tired. To anyone else it probably just sounds like any old baby cry, but to me he's saying 'ARGH I'm so TIRED my baby brain needs SLEEP!' SO I give him a special underchin wedge hug and he drops off pretty quickly. We've mastered laying down feeding which is lovely, it's a great opportunity to have a cuddle and it's better than watching tv while feeding him anyway.

Oh and he had 4 craps today. He usually has one huge one first thing in the morning, lovely to wake up to heh, but today he had 4. I was horrified/impressed.

Today, Leo found his feet. It was a picture that so needed to be taken. Alas, batteries in camera are dead. It was amazing. I sat him up and his face went deadly serious, as his little hands grabbed at one foot at a time. he was concentrating SO HARD. He got annoyed eventually because sdespite his best efforts, he couldn't get his foot into his mouth. Or his mouth onto his foot, as he leaned forwrds concentrating with his mouth wide open. Hah.

He likes playing peek-a-boo now too, instead of just being scared and confused at why the hell Mummy is putting her hands over our faces and squealing at random intervals.

He has random teething days, which are awful. He just cries and sleeps and has a red cheek all day. I was rund my Mums when he ha done last, we tried to go for a walk but he just screamed and screamed. He wouldn;t feed properly either, it was quite upsetting.

Oh and Drool is out in full force now. It's quite frightening how much fluid one bay leaks per day! Probably enough to propagate one whole drought ridden country with a bountiful supply of crops.

( Splish splash I was takin' a bath... )

( Leo and me. CHEESE WARNING!! )

Today was fun.

Leo now loves having raspberrys blown on his feet, his feet being played with in general, having his nose beeped, being rolled around on the floor, sitting up with cushions, cuddling his teddy, watching me play bass, getting in the bath with me, having my hair swooshed over him, and chewing his elephant rattle.

Ross isn't here enough. Leo did this horrible scared cry the other day when Ross tried to play with him, and won't let him settle him for bed anymore, he just sreams. I don't think he knows who is half the time. Well, we have fun without him anyway, and I'm not going to nag Ross about it, it's his problem if he doesn't want to spend time with his son. His loss. He doesn't know what he's missing.

Bad stuff: Leo had his booster jabs, poor guy was SO pissed off for 2 days after, and I was ill with a snuffly snotty thing, so we just slept loads and when we weren't sleeping we whinged. I took some photos of us looking sorry for ourselves and laying in bed watching the fluffy clouds roll by on the blue sky. EeerghI felt so guilty and traumatised at the doctors because he fell asleep, and then of course had to be woken up screaming as his injections were done. Ooof it was horrible but he stopped crying as soon as I gave him a cuddle.

Good stuff! : He laughs! And not just when we tickle him either. He can pull himself up to a sitting position if you give him your fingers to hold, and if you blow a raspberry on his forehead he squeals and laughs. weirdo. He also appreciates verbal humour and can tell when I am being stupid. Dismissive 'stupid Mummy' laugh is different to 'I like you! Do that again!' laugh. He likes playing 'Baby rocket zoom' where he gets blasted of my knee wth a push of his legs, and has fun in the bath. I've started getting in the bath with him as it was really fucking my back up to lean over the bath every night.

He still hates belly time but I'm doing rolling excersizes with him, encouraging him to roll off his belly if he hates it so much!

I went out to town after he had his jabs, (he fell asleep in his papoose/sling/carrier thing) and bought him some new toys and stuff, one of which is a cot-side light/projector/lullabye machine. I love it, Leo loves it, everyone is happy. You can choose to have 'soothing nature sounds' as one of the programme settings, but after some frog ribbits and some splashing waves, this really ominous howling wind starts up! It's evil. Seriously, like somethingout of an old horror film We'll stick to twinkle twinkle little star thanks.

I was looking at mobiles and there was one for FORTY QUID! It was remote controlled and had elite classical music and super swooshy moving toys and stuff. I felt like a bad parent for just getting the cheaper thingy but all my worries vanished when he laid smiling at it and staaaring at thr lights for ages. And and and! Usually he takes like 2 hours of fussy bouncing/cuddling/dancing/singing/trying to get him to feed before he chills out enough to take a decent feed and drop off. NOT TONIGHT! Noooo, super brill new pretty lights and music totally calmed him down and he was in bed by 9.30. Which is just amazing and great. hooray.

Oh my god some strangers prodded him and stroked his face saying hoe lovely he was. He gave them filthy looks, and so did I. Infact I nearly fainted. Horrible dirty stranger hands, errgh.

Okay so now Leo has a million priceless expressions and I tried to catch a few on camera. I made a dictaphone recording of him talking to me and when he got fed up I said 'Okay, say bye bye', and with impeccable comic timing he did a massive very audible wet fart. Bless.

( The many (none grumpy) expressions of Le Petit Leo )

So. Progress!

About 3 weeks ago he started knawing his hands
2 weeks ago he started drooling
2 weeks ago he started smiling up and me, cooing, and blowing raspy spit bubbles when he's finished feeding
3 weeks ago his hair started growing back, and now he is all fluffy scalped, with a big bald band round the back and a little old man mullet thing underneath
This week he has started laughing out loud but it takes a lot of effort to get it out of him, lots of tickling which annoys him after a while
This week he has starting sleeping in his own basket/cot all night instead of sharing the bed with me and Ross
Last night my magical mummy B.O got him to sleep. He was fussing so I put my sweaty jumper near him and he settled straight away
3 weeks ago he started headbutting me! He realy flings himself around when he's pissed off.
3 weeks ago he started paying lots of attention to his toys and grabbing them as they dangled infront of him on his 3d playmat thing. last night he started staring at his hands while grabbing my pyjamas.
2 weeks ago he started becaoming very responsive to lullabies and general singing, they shut him up straight away.
Last month he learned to follow objects pretty accurately when moved infront of him, but he's refining that all the time
This week he's started turning towards a voice he can't see if we call him
2 weeks ago he started hating his carseat and pushchair, I think he has gone from being soothed by the womb like motions to just feeling restricted and bored.
Like most babies he hates me dressing him, but for some reason he loves having his nappy changed, and will smile his head off, especially first thing in the morning (which helps me with the evil tired-fog lifting).
He hasn't quite figured out not to hit himself in the face with his flailing exploring hands.
He generally doesn't cry for no reason, is easily settled and has easily readable cries. To me anyway.
He hates being on his belly, which is a little worrying as he needs belly time to make progress. But he just cries as soon as I put him down, has a paddy and gets nowhere. And then acts all hurt and sorry for himself when I pick him up. I've tried laying with him, singing, bribing with something interesting etc but he just hates it.
The colicky crying he used to do has stopped and he settles well most nights, going to sleep at 10ish and waking up at 8ish, with two or three feeds inbetween.

Things are generally good :) Just need to be braver with getting out of the house alne with him. Hard when you're breastfeeding, as I don't particularly want to do it in public in Middlesbrough, but I can't stay in the house forever. Bought him a frog chair for his bedroom even though he wont be able to sit on it or use it in any way at all for about a year. Heh.

Well, I'm very bad at updating this, but I figure it's better to be too busy looking after him to do it than leaving him sat starving in a rotting nappy while I type his latest acheivements into this little box.

He's in the bath with his Daddy at the moment (Daddy is making monkey noises at him) so I have 5 minutes.

The health visitor came round a couple of weeks ago and weighed him, he's 12lb something, whatever, it's good, he's right on track for his growth and all that. Then he had to have his jabs (ook) which was horrible. The day after he had them he kept crying like I've never heard before, so sorry for himself and upset. His legs swelled up pretty badly too. but then he was fine, phew.

Other stuff:
Behind his ears goes disgusting if you don't dry them thoroughly after bathing, eww.
He is starting to love being upright with his legs straight. He forces them out and won't sit on my knee contentedly anymore, he wants to bounce on his feet. So I'm nabbing my Mum's baby bouncer to put him in, I think he'll love it.
He has these little bells that he plays with too. He still hates 'belly time'. He's perfectly capable of pushing himself up, but gets pissed off very quickly. He really concentrates when I sit him in his chair infront of his toys. He hasn't quite figured out what his hands are for yet but he has inadvertantly grabbed stuff, including my hair and nipples. Ow.