The Cost of Babies

Great night sleep last now. Am full of beans today.
Came across this article on the BBC site about how Babies Cost 1560GBP Before Birth
Prams and pushchairs were the most expensive - yup.
One in five moved house - well doing it now.
One in fifty spent over five grand before the baby was born - nope.
And with hindsight the biggest waste of money was baby carriers followed by bottle warmers. Well, we've tried four carriers but we only bought two. The Wilkinet was very good until now and the new CalinBleu one is ideal now he's looking around more.
We didn't get caught in the bottle warmers trap mainly cos Elias has barely touched bottles - maybe two or three times in total.
Did I mention he's now eating some banana each day...

This is what it's like...

Just when he's busted 4 nights of waking every hour on the hour on yo ass, he sleeps through til 11pm. We've been with our neighbours upstairs drinking champagne celebrating moving out and he kept on sleeping. It's now 11 and he's just woken. Sweet sweet three hours of sleep. Let's see how the night pans out...

Packing

Sunday morning and I'm packing..... books, cds, clothes, bookc, cds and er books and er cds. This is crazy. New project...digitise my cds and get rid of them. Books I keep for Elias... there are a whole bunch he will love that I haven't even looked in since i was a kid. Feels like this is going on forever....haven't got time to clear stuff out now so I'll have to do it when we unpack at the other end...

"Help! Help!"

That's what I woke up to this morn as Stephanie wrestled with Elias and his copious morning caca. Result: quick shower, new clothes, happy Elias.

The flat is beginning to disappear into boxes...

Reflection

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

Haven't really posted much of late as it's been pretty fraught here waiting to exchange contracts on H ............. (at this point Elias cried and I had to go see him) ...........


ourrrahhh...Hillmarton est vendu! - on demenage le 3 ou 8 fevrier ! ourrrahhh ourraahh a plus de place, d'air pure, de gens civilises, de belles vue, d'un parc et d'un nouveau lit!!! hahahaaa

Elias se reveille toujours beaucoup la nuit...22h ou Paul le console, puis 23h ou je l'allaite, puis 2h du mat ou Paul le console puis 3 ou 4h ou je l'allaite puis...6h reveil! -

Paul et moi on est mort et ...ca deviend difficile physiquement et mentalement! on tiend le coups mais c'est dure!

J'ai toujours de la peine a croire que de laisser pleurer un bb et la facon la plus saine de l'aider a passer des bonnes nuits - surtout pas quand le bb pleure 1h ou 2h...-(qui sait peut-etre que dans 2 mois je penserai differement!!!?..)

Elias a decouvert ses pieds! qu'il mordille regulierement!!! Puis il adore le petit lion que sa grand-meme (haha!) lui a offert d'afrique!

Ah est finalement...Elias a mange sa premiere portion (une petite cuillere) de riz pour bb hier - il a bien aimer...la portion d'aujourd'hui encore mieux car moins laiteuse!

P'tit Lion

The balloon again

Push the Button

Scary business... Elias eyes my mobile phone and reaches for it. But.......worse.......... he has discovered the button on the Jungle Gym that turns on the monophonic Mozart :(

Btw, I have received an email request for the anonymous 'tiredness' poet of the other day reveal their identity...... or at the very least to post again. Ironically, it was Dave Adam who asked - and I had thought the Tiredness lines were his! --

I thought the "tiredness" comment of the other day was very poetic too! and realised that...we are not that tired yet!!! stephanie

---
...Elias est maintenant interesse au portable de Paul, la nourriture que je mange, le telephone, les boutons de la "jungle gym" qui jouent du mozart horrible! - Puis a quatre pattes il manque peu pour qu'il avance en avant...pour le moment il va en arriere!!!

Dans quelques semaines il va commencer a manger des...legumes et fruits en puree je crois - j'ai appris aujourd'hui que le "baby rice" (riz pour bb) en fait est tres dure a digerer et pas la meilleure chose a donner a un bb (en plus il parait que ca a le gout de papier mache)...alors a moi un peu plus de lecture sur le sujet!

Je suis sortie de mon rendez-vous hebdomadaire d'allaitement aujourd'hui ayant promis que demain je commence un cours de 3 mois sur l'allaitement afin de pouvoir volontairement aider les mamans qui desirent allaiter mais qui n'y arrivent pas, ou qui pensent qu'elles ne peuvent pas, ou qui souffrent durant l'allaitement ou encore pour essayer d'influencer celles qui ne veulent pas! -- Vu que c'est un sujet que je trouve facinant et qui me tiend a coeur (le bonheur de voir son bb grandir de cette maniere la!), pourquoi pas!? - Vive l'allaitement avec ces bons (qui sont beaucoup plus important que les mauvais!) et mauvais cotes!

Finalement...si tout va bien ...on demenage bientot! Si tout va bien...vous pourez venir nous trouver et avoir une chambre a vous (mais pas de lit! a part un fouton) - Elias aura sa chambre avec vue meme que il aura surement la vue de notre chambre pour quelques temps encore- (ok il aura deux vues! et il pourra choisir!) - touchez du bois!

Postman Pat Balloon

Over the weekend much pleasure has been derived from a Postman Pat balloon and the discovery that pulling the string has some correlation with the balloon moving.

When he's on his back he flips to his front in an instant, can move backwards and is beginning to lift himself up on to his knees. Fingers crossed that we can move out of here before he starts crawling properly.

New habit - emitting a high pitched squeel (sp?) whilst making his face read and seemingly holding his breath. Hmm.

Tired

This parenting lark is not getting easier. Well, in some ways maybe it is. I think I worry less. However in the realm of sleep we're all over the place. There is no pattern - some nights are good, some not so good and some appalling. Result: two very tired parents.

Moving away from moaning for a moment Elias is growing - over 8kg - rolling over and crawling (kinda) backwards only. Sometimes he'll take a bottle of water for fun and hold it himself like a big boy, but never when you actually want him to feed.

It's a bit day after day at the moment, which was alleviated yesterday with a Postman Pat helium balloon on a string. I was almost jealous... and so was Pushkar.

What we did this weekend.

Saturday we went flat-hunting as we are soon moving out of Hillmarton Road at long last - fingers crossed. Saw a rubbish flat and the dream flat.

In the afternoon my Mum came up from Hampshire and we had a chilled afternoon sitting around drinking tea and playing with Elias and talking.

Last night I went to Ackers' for his birthday with Bency. We were supposed to watch the afore mentioned Kraftwerk DVD but spent most of the evening talking about parenthood and other subjects less fit for this blog before squeezing the DVD in at about 1am.

This morning S, E and I went up to the Heath with Ackers and Jude for a rainy walk and a coffee/cake combo at Kenwood House. British-style we sat outside in the cold and wet, happy as anything.

Btw, can anyone tell us if this is how you fix the Wilkinet sling on your back?

Upside down

I'd been wanting to do this for ages, turn Elias upside down from his back and lay him down on to his front, but waited until he was old enough and I was shown how to do it. It was great fun! Oh, and Elias enjoyed it too.

Stefanie says this picture has something of the Michael Jackson about it. No balconies though.

Pub

After a long and muddy walk on the Heath with Talia, Nistan and Alba we adjourned to The Freemason's Arms in Hampstead for a much needed drink. Elias' first trip to a pub was a mixture of amazement which soon gave way to ennui. I guess, like beer, it's an acquired taste.

2006

Yey! 2006! on a passe le cap a Oxford chez Simon, Ness et Cassius! Lucky Ben, Penel et Jude etaient la aussi - Elias et Jude on dormi dans la meme chambre - ils se sont mutuellement reveille...puis a 23h Elias etait definitivement reveille, et cela jusqu'a 2h du matin! Donc il a passe le cap avec nous! Il etait tout content malgre (il avait passe le cap de la fatigue...!)!

On a passe une excellente soiree et a 2h on est tous alle se coucher - Elias nous a reveille a 6h15! hmm...Puis on a decide de partir tot afin d'etre sure que Elias fasse sa sieste du matin (chose plus facile dans la voiture que dans un endroit inconnu pour lui je crois!) - Et nous on a fait une sieste avec Elias cet apres-midi pendant 2heures!

Resolutions...d'etre plus atentionnes avec les autres!..(surtout ceux qui sont hyper atentionnes avec nous!!!)

2006 s'annonce bien! Un petit garcon plein d'energie, de sourires - Un homme magnifique - Pleins d'idees pour rendre notre vie meilleurs - Une ouverture d'esprit et peut-etre la possibilite de vivre hors de Londres (Paris...et autres)- Hampstead Heath (un parc magnifique) pas loin - une bonne sante -

Ce soir, pour celebrer la nouvelle annee on allait se commander un repas Take Away! Puis finalement on a decide autrement mais, ca nous a fait penser que depuis que l'on se connait on a mange que 2 take away et ceux la avec ma maman (Fish&Chips!) - et ca me fait penser que depuis que je connais Paul on a regarder la tele ou film video/dvd 15 x max!

Je vous souhaite a tous pleins de joie et bonheur!