"Come on over Vaaaaalllerie" (Nanna)

A busy morning for Steph was made possible by the new easy going version of Curtis we now have. A visit from the health visitor follow by a trip out in the pram to the doctors surgery, which is luckily just across the road. Curtis did manage to cause a little bit of a scene in the waiting room but thats what babies do and if the other people in the waiting room dont like it... who cares?

Steph and Curtis arrived home to find a package that was actually addressed to Curtis. His first ever mail. It was from Ryan and mind reader Ryan managed to buy the exact 2 books that Steph had been looking for. Well not so much mind reader and more that Ryan knows about these sorts of things and have similar minds on baby matters.


Later auntie Lisa came round and along with Steph and Curtis took the pram for a walk. Curtis didnt like it much at first and made such a fuss crying that he steamed up the rain cover on the pram and they couldn't see him anymore. All day long Steph and Lisa had been singing the Zutons song " why don't you come on over Valerie" in honour of the imminent arrive of Nanna Valerie from Belfast.


I picked my mum from the airport after work and we arrived home to a fantastic 3 course meal cooked by Auntie Lisa who is such a star and has promised to come over and cook us food once a week Hoooraaaah!!

Mum brought loads more cool things for Curtis and some baby photos of me to compare with Curtis which I ll talk about tomorrow cause we're all really tired and are off to bed.

G.

Curtis is official!!!

Today felt like a normal day " like what real people have" Curtis woke up a little earlier than usual but didnt make much of a fuss. He had his breakfast and then had another snooze. This gave us time to both have showers and breakfast ourselves.

To our suprise we got a second sunny day in a row so in a make hay will the sun shines fashion we wrapped sleeping curtis in his outdoor clothes and strapped him in his harness for another outdoor adventure. Today we walked to the park and Curtis climbed on his first climbing frame. We had no idea that this play park was right on our door step.

On the way home we called in on Nicola across the road who had baby Annie just last Tuesday and whom we hadn't meet yet. Curtis Though managed to sleep through all of this.

Today was also the day to register Curtis's birth. Also the first time that we had to be anywhere with Curtis at a certain designated time. So right on queue 35 mins before our appointment and just as we're about to leave, outdoor suit already on, Curtis wakes up hungry and needs feed. Then of course feeding makes him poo and he needs changed.

We did make it and only 5 mins late. So its now officially Curtis Aaron Hughes. Right at the last minute we almost stuck an S in there so his initials were cash but his name has such a good ring to it as it is. Again though Curtis slept through his entire outdoor experience.

Later in the evening we placed curtis on his front to see if he could manage to support himself and he did for a while keep his head up by himself. But I think the events of the day had worn him out.

Sunny Sunday

A sunny sunday afternoon also brought a relatively peacefull day. Although Curtis is still not sleeping much at all during the day at least in the last few days he's starting to learn that being awake dosen't mean you need to be crying. Some of the baby books we ve read say that newborns sleep for up to 16 hrs a day. Curtis seems to survive on about 8. With the amount of feeding he's demanding there is not enough hrs in the day for him to sleep that long.

We managed a trip outside again today, uncle Jamie came round with the lovely Millie and we went for a walk around the block. We used the harness rather than the pram which Curtis took a bit of getting used to but liked it eventually.

Later Steph and Jamie divised a game to help learn baby sign language. Using the cards bought for us by Uncle Tim and Lizzie, they held a card aloft then the other acted out the sign shown on that card and the former had to guess which sign was being acted out. I didnt want to put a downer on the great fun they were having by reminding them it only works if you remember to teach Curtis aswell.

Due to increasing hunger whilst being left holding a sleeping baby and not knowing the baby sign for "can you 2 please stop playing that now and reach me some food" I divised a new stratedy for eating off a sleeping babys head.

Curtis seemed more aware of things today. I think now that he has stopped crying long enough to look around he has discovered there is fun to be had interacting with and staring at diferent things. He even grabbed hold of 1 of his toys, although probably more by chance than by design. It even looked like was saw a smile or happy face. but then again it could have been a burp.

With a little help from our friends.

Yesterday was quite a difficult day and as we were both very tired and had nothing good to say we decided not to say anything.

However today was made much easier with help from our great friends. Through great understanding of the inability to do much for yourself when trying to breatfeed and then settle a newborn baby Sonia and Alan arrived to Stephs rescue today with 4 helping hands and a bowl full of food. Sonia has loads of nephews and nieces and seems to know exactly what is needed to survive the day. Little things like picking everything up off the floor were you cant reach them.

Also Uncle Jamie arrive with a mountain of fresh fruit and a yummy sandwich from the posh sandwich shop at the end of the road. Hooray!!!!

Also today Curtis Graduated from the washing up bowl to the large baby bath. In the bath is the only time tthat I ve never seen Curtis cry.

Finally in the evening Ryan came round with yet another bag full of goodies. This time a new harness for carrying curtis, a bag full of clothes too small for Sophia and a present from his mum.

Wednesday, Thursday happy days!

After about 8 days of relentless crying from the wee man…crying (yelling!) during and after feeds, crying as soon as he wakes up and at times crying in his sleep…we have just had two days of peace. I began to feel nervous about every feed and anxious when he did finally sleep fearing how loud and for how long he’d yell when he woke up, but by this afternoon I actually felt relaxed when he slept confident that on waking he might just grumble a little, stretch his arms and fall back to sleep or demand a little entertainment or peaceful feeding. We are none the wiser whether this was all due to growth spurts, something that disagreed with him via my breastmilk, the fast milk flow or some combination…but I have to say I’m absolutely relieved to have had a day when I could start to feel human again. I have been reluctant, or its just been impossible to invite anyone round when he’s been like this so apologies to those who wanted to visit this past week or so and couldn’t. I’m just praying that this peaceful phase continues for a while…or forever! So today we actually had some fun and the wee guy made me laugh again…we also had the messiest time at the changing station when he managed to both wee up the wall and poop all down my top (from one foot away!) both at the same time then throw his feet and legs in everything. The resulting mess meant a bath for the wee guy which is certainly one of his favourite activities. Now rather than sitting frog like in the water he excitedly pushes his legs full stretch and is a struggle to hold…so from now on it’s over to his proper baby bath as he’s outgrown the washing up bowl that had been perfect until now! He also pulled a whole heap of funny and happy looking faces today that I’m sad to say I didn’t have a chance to capture on camera…but it made me see glimpses of the little boy we’ll soon be getting to know.


Auntie Lisa popped round later in the afternoon and had a mega bonding session with the little man. He even snuffled and sniffed right in her armpit. Which is a sign of great affection.

S x

3 Weeks old Today

After 2 days of giving mum absolute hell, little man decided to celebrate his 3 week birthday and dads day off by becoming the perfect child. Hes been calm and playfull when awake, has feeded without problems and has slept for long stints. Good that he got that out of his system so he can go back to screaming baby when mums her by herself for the next few days.





Steph has identified that his feeding problems seem to be coming from an over reactive letdown responce which causes an abnormally high flowrate of milk. The little man cannae gulp it down fast enough and ends up choking.


The breast feeding support people came up with a genious sugestion by using gravity to slow this down. But as you can see from the picture it looks wrong and hilarious when he's feeeding.





Claire came to visit for the first time. Congratultions on becoming a home owner. Claire and Eamon just bought a flat and should be moving in at the end of the month. Claire also brought these lovely presents for curtis.








Also arrived in the post today was this cool hoody outfit from Lynne Andy and Molly.

The 3rd and 4th week blues

More support staff came to see us today, This time breast feeding support. They reassured us that its perfectly normal for Curtis to do nothing but cry, eat and very occasionally sleep, at this stage. The 3 rd and 4 th weeks are apparently the worst. All the health visitors seem to use the same copping tactics of telling you that it all becomes OK after week 6. I think on week 5 they ll probably tell us week 8 is great. Feels like when you re learning to swim and just as you think you re about to reach the safety of a supporting parent they start to slowly move away from you again to encourage you to go further.

The ideal solution seemed for steph to carry Curtis around in a sling all day so that he got the comfort of being near to Steph. However as neither of us have 6 arms or a degree in Origami the baby slings that we bought have not proven greatly successful.

On the bright side (quite literally) the nice electrian man finally came and put up our bling bling new light in the front room removing the finally trace of the old 70's decor.

SAD FARWELL TO SUPER MUM AND STEVO

After 5 weeks of looking after us, supermum headed back to Norfolk today with Stevo…and not without a few tears. We four really began to feel that we all lived here together, with mum very much at home in her room with Alice and the dogs. Before leaving Nanny Ronnie and Stevo took out the recycling and rubbish bins, loaded up the dishwasher and washed bed sheets…Ronnie then left Steph some sandwiches she could reach from the bed/breastfeeding station, as well as leaving a chicken casserole cooking in the oven and a bottle of red wine and a glass ready for when Gareth came home at 9pm. Unbelievably Ronnie and Stevo managed to get everything in the car including Alice and her quadruplets and hopefully by now have made a safe return to Norfolk. A huge thanks to them both for re-arranging their schedules to make time for an extended stay in order to help us out with Curtis as well as spend some much needed time together. It has been very much appreciated and a lot of fun…thanks for all the cooking, cleaning, Curtis sitting, the entertainment, the laughs. We’ve had a much more restful January than we would have done otherwise, Gareth now has lots of ironed shirts in the wardrobe, we have a zillion new birds now visting the garden, and have the nanny Ronnie superior clothes drying station working flat out in the hallway drying the wee mans clothes. Luckily the one thing that didn’t fit in the car was the xmas tree Ronnie got in the sales, so looks like they will have to come back for at least one more visit this year!

The health visitor came this morning to check on the wee man…who isn’t so wee anymore. Again a good increase in weight…as he has now reached 9lb2oz! After a night of little sleep, Steph stationed herself in the bedroom after everyone left to begin her first day alone with Curtis….she made the bed into a nest where she could feed and entertain the wee man and grab some naps anytime he fell asleep…which wasn’t often! …then in the evening Lucy and Lou came to visit. Lucy showed Stephs some shiatsu points to use on the little man to ease hiccups and wind and Curtis put on a great display showing his entire range of moods for Lucys visit including happy to see you baby, I need feeding baby, grumpy and screaming with wind, grumpy and screaming for no reason we could fathom, cute monkey sleeping, happy being changed man and I need more boobie man.

S x

Rockstar Curtis 3 outfit changes in 1 Day

The celebritiy lifestyle of appearing to the masses on his very own blog everyday seems to be going to Curtis's head as today he required 3 outfit changes - all brand new clothes. It may also be due to the fact that he keeps managing to wee all over himself even though he's wearing a nappy. Most of the time the nappy is bone dry yet his clothes soaking.


This evening Ryan came to meet Curtis for the first time. Ryan brought many amazing presents for Curtis including this little sheep that he's sleeping with. Not to mention all the things Ryan and his sister Lisa gave us before Curtis was born Such as moses basket, microwave steriliser and loads of new born clothes.. Amazing, thanks Ryan and Lisa.

Curtis Meets Snow!!!!!!!

Curtis met snow for the first time today. He woke us up at 5.30 am for us to discover the outside world had been carpeted in white.

So mummy Steph dressed curtis in another outside suit that is ridiculously too big for him and headed to play in the back Garden.

Unfortunetly the little man didnt appreciate the cold air and the strange cold wet white powdery stuff and so didnt enjoy the experience as much as as hoped. However there is always time to build a snowman.

Jamie and Dan came for dinner. As will probably be the case for some time now, if you are going to come here for dinner you better be prepareed to cook it yourself. Luckly not only was Jamie prepared to cook the meal himself he also went to the shops and bought all the ingredience. These ae the kind of friends you need when you have a baby who refuses to go to sleep no matter how tired he is.