Routines

When I had Caitlin I thought I would be a person who would loathe routines. EVERYBODY said let the baby lead you, feed on demand, as long as she sleeps it doesn't matter where and on and on and on.

In the last year I have learnt that this doesn't work for me. If I let her lead all we would do would be watch ITNG until she crashed because she couldn't physically stay awake any longer. If I fed her on demand we would have taken much longer to discover her reflux as she was comfort sucking to ease her throat and wanting to suck every half hour. If I let her sleep when and wherever we would probably still be at the stage of her only sleeping on my lap for 20 min bursts. None of which was really working.

At the moment we have a great routine going when Ben is home. We're having an early dinner at 5:30 as a family, quite often the same food too. Today Caitlin had 2 frozen tuna and potato patties, our continental rice with carrot, peas and corn, seconds of our rice, thirds of our rice, tiny bits of my schnitzel and nearly a whole tin of apple custard. This was after having half a slice of bread 15 mins earlier because I wasn't cooking fast enough and was followed by a whole cup of milk. (And about 3 poos for those interesed in TMI, she had to make room somehow...). Dad then goes to have a shower after his bike ride home while I clean up Caitlin, Caitlin is then given a bath and dressed by Dad while I clean up the floor/walls/highchair and get the washing up started. Caitlin then runs round drinking her cup of milk and playing with toys while Ben watches the Simpsons and I use the computer and have a cup of tea. Either of us then put her to bed at 730, its usually Ben just becasue he doesn't see her as much. It's me when the cricket is on in Perth.

And its a lovely end to the day.

Learning to eat

Today Caitlin decided she would eat her baked bean dinner herself. She was reasonably content to ease her hunger by letting Mummy feed her to begin with (because it was soooo loooonnnng since afternoon tea...) but after a while we were definitely in 'I do it' territory.

Lately she has been trying to get her food onto the spoon or fork herself and she does succeed on the odd occasion. When that became too hard it was fingers, picking up fistfulls of baked beans then smushing them into her mouth, palm flat, and kind of sucking them off while the juice dripped down her chin. Finally we got to lifting the bowl up (those suction ones so do not work by the way, don't waste your money) and slurping out the contents. You can see the results below. Got to love her.

And because I'm such a mean mummy (should have seen the out takes from the santa photo today) here's the first photo I took and then decided didn't make the cut.

Year 9 are evil...

Kids just get to a stage in high school, around about half-way through year 8 where everything goes to pot (metaphorically as well as possibly literally for some) until the time they are doing the school certificate in year 10. Just about all of them come out the end of the tunnel as better people, even the lovely 70 class I had in my first year. Who became 8Y in my second year, who I thankfully didn't have to teach in my third year, small mercies. Now I'm having some extended contact with them again they seem to have come out alright.

But at that point half way through year 8, when they're no longer shiny little year 7s who tend not to muck up too much and if they do the threat of a phone call to mum settles them down again, they seem to lose the plot. I can't wait until I have one of my own...

Big girl

I've been on the verge of writing a new post many times since Caitlin's first birthday party but put it off because I couldn't think of the right thing to say for such a momentus occasion. My bubba is a Big Girl now. Walking, saying lots of words and understanding a whole lot more. My current favourite is 'goh', which is 'gone', and is accompanied by a shrug with hands up in the air (and quite often when I've initiated the saying of 'gone' when I've put the whatever-mummy-has-that-Caitlin-wants item out of her line of sight it's accompanied by a look of there's something not quite right).

But today Caitlin struck me as a Big Girl when we went to the shops to get our groceries. She was wearing a proper size 1 big girl t-shirt and a pair of 3/4 denim shorts rather than the onesie and whatever is not stained shorts she usually wears. I couldn't find the trolley insert so it was into the seat she went, with her cup of milk. She sat there very proudly, waved at everyone and tried to hand the man at the donut shop the loyalty card but he took too long so she ate it.

Luckily for her mummy however, when a nice romantic song came on in the juice aisle I was able to waltz with her, doing spins and fancy steps, holding her hand while she sat in the trolley. Much giggling and a big long cuddle were the result so I guess she's not too much of a big girl to be embarassed by her mummy acting like a clown in public yet.