Home Truths Tear in a Home

According to the BBC today parents who offer each other reciprocal childcare could soon be forced to register as childminders, with all the associated bureaucracy. I have friends who I did NCT classes with who both work full time and have an arrangement that one of them will look after both children one day per week and the other will look after both another day per week. Under the new proposals these friends will be forced to either abandon this relationship or register as childminders.

With formal childcare costs being prohibitive to some families, many now rely on grandparents, other relations and friends to care for their kids while they work. Ending such relationships could mean some parents being forced to give up working and lose much needed income. How can forcing working parents, who are trying to improve things for their families, further towards the poverty line benefit their children?

Has Become Nothing More Than Dirt in Some Dirty Town

The numerous joys of motherhood no. 4298...

You take your toddler to visit your very house-proud Mother-in-Law. Your toddler poops on the floor.

They Just Move to the Other Side

Having been in and out of the doctors/hospital for about 4 weeks my Grandma had emergency surgery on Monday evening for a twisted bowel. They had warned us that she was pretty weak and that they would only do life-saving surgery. She spent the rest of the week with a million tubes and wires doing pretty much everything for her. On Thursday evening they took her off the ventilator and warned us that her organs were failing and that they would not recusitate her if crashed. She lasted 4 hours and then stopped breathing in her sleep at just after midnight on Thursday night.

I am glad that things ended how they did as I couldn't bear the thought of her breathing on her own but still having to be fed by tube etc. More than anything she valued her independence and the prognosis meant she would never be independent again. She will, however, be very much missed.

The last time I saw her, on Wednesday evening, I stroked her hand and told her about what the children had been up to. She couldn't answer as she was barely conscious and was on a ventilator but she opened her eyes really wide as I told her about the kids recent antics. I will prefer to remember her not in a hospital connected to wires and machines but a few weeks ago, sitting in my Mum's front room watching the children play and talking to Olivia. Olivia and Grace won't remember her but I am glad she got to meet them.

Even Though She's Only Very Small She'll Leave You in No Doubt at All

The numerous joys of motherhood no. 4297...

Yesterday Olivia wouldn't nap in the afternoon while she was with Grandma. By the time I got home from work she wanted to go to sleep in her buggy...at 5pm. As her bedtime is 6.30 I didn't think this was a great idea and put it to her that she just needed to have her tea and then we would go home to bed. I got her out of the buggy, where she had parked herself, and took her dummy out...

Que much wailing and gnashing of teeth...

A clear 45+ minutes of screaming ensued with lots of trying to whack me etc.

The joys of motherhood? ...the words 'go away Mummy, I DON'T LOVE YOU!'

A Voice Now Past

Anyone who knows me will know that when my girls are teenagers I will be making them watch Dirty Dancing... A LOT! This was the soundtrack of my own teenage years and I can't wait to share it with my darling daughters.

We salute you Patrick.

I'll leave him to have the final word.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y97bWP33d8I

They Put Us on a Transport to the Stars

Update on the buggy....

EVERYONE hated it, it was difficult to push, difficult to steer, just difficult...then my Dad pointed out that all the tyres were totally flat! Never occurred to me that they would need pumping up straight out of the box! Anyway it is now fine to push and steer. Daddy M looooovvvvvvveeees it as you can adjust the handlebar up and down which is doing wonders for his back. The only down side of this adjustment is that the handlebar has a little give in it as it is not one solid piece of metal but effectively hinged to allow it to be adjusted. I have never tried a P&T Sport but I imagine this is probably the case with them as well. The only bad thing we have found is something totally personal to us - the mudguards are exactly the height to catch on the stairs when my mum takes it up to her front door - not a huge issue. I really like the colour - enough pink to make it a little girlie but not as in your face as the pink camo P&T. We have cow print buggy snuggles from last winter which will look super cute on it when it starts to get really chilly. Miraculously it hasn't rained all week so we haven't had a go with the rain cover yet but I like the fact that it is an elasticated front and not those silly fiddly poppers on the P&T. The back seat could do with a recline but that is the only functionality it is missing.

All things considered I think this was a good choice and I don't think that I could have justified the cost of a new P&T. I am going to Ebay what is left of the old P&T and see what I can get for it to offset some of the cost of the oBaby.

A Collection

Here's a selection of snaps from my phone from the last few months. Quality is pretty deplorable, I'm afraid. Sorry!

The first is Liv posing with one of the lions at Harlaxton Manor (see main post here). Harlaxton is owned by the University of Evansville, so is normally full of American students, but every so often, they open it up to the hoi polloi, and we enjoyed roaming the grounds and making friends with the local swan.


Liv has been pestering us to let her take Teddy to the park in the buggy my mother bought for her. Normally, Teddy wears PJs, as he pretty much stays in Liv's bed, but he had to get dressed for the overcast weather. Liv was quite good about pushing him, which was a nice change from how she is with her bike, where she normally rides it for a grand total of a hundred yards or so, then says, "Daddy, you carry it."

A few weeks ago, I had both girls with me. Liv brought her bike and Grace was strapped to my front in a Baby Bjorn carrier). Predictably enough, Liv demanded I carry her bike after just enough to make it really inconvenient to take it back home. Hey ho - we got to the park and everything was fine for three quarters of an hour, when I noticed that Liv was flagging and that it was time we went back for lunch anyway.

After Olivia threw a massive screaming fit in the playground when I said we were going home, I ended up carrying a kicking and screaming child in one hand, a bike in the other and poor Grace still stuck on my front. It was an extremely uncomfortable journey, not made any better by the looks from the people we passed. Most rolled their eyes as if to say, "Terrible Twos, huh?" but a few seemed to be looking at me suspiciously as though I must have done something awful to my distraught child, doubtless not helped by the fact that having been punched, gouged and kicked repeatedly by the demon slung over my shoulder, I lost my rag and bawled her out in the street, which didn't exactly make me look like a candidate for parent of the year. In my defence, testicles are extremely delicate and having a child rake its fingernails down your cheek really fucking hurts. I would also like to add this is unusual behaviour for Liv, lest anyone be too concerned.

Teddy seemed to command more respect, and she dutifully pushed him most of the way to and from the park. Maybe he should come every time...



Here's a picture of Liv and Grace on the fire engine in the park (Teddy out of shot) Mummy's hand in shot). Grace can't really join in too much apart from the swings yet, but she does like to try. I think she was operating the gear stick....


Here's Liv in her new motor, a beautiful yellow and red number, powered by a V6 Flintstone-style engine.Mummy picked it up for a few quid on eBay (we try not to buy plastic toys new if we can avoid it). She loves pushing it round and round the stone circle outside the French windows. She'll be a natural at roundabouts when she's older.


Finally, a shot of Grace with her Auntie A__, demonstrating that she can stand completely unaided for about thirty seconds, as long as she doesn't realise she's doing it...

Wide Awake, Sometimes Sleeping

When you are 10 months life can just be too exciting.

Travel With Me and We'll See..

The Phil and Teds is falling apart and so I have finally bitten the bullet and got my hand in mypocket for a new buggy. The fact that Olivia walks a lot of the time and may only want a buggy for another year or so meant that I couldn't justify the cost of another P&T. I have been going round and round in circles wandering what to do until I came across the OBaby XI.

http://www.obaby.co.uk/product_details.php?category_id=150&item_id=1395

As far as we can see the main difference between this and a P&T is...oh...about £200!

Went off this morning to a local baby tat superstore to see it in real life and messed about with one there. Haven't road tested it yet but watch this space to see if it lives up to expectation. Certainly has a few nice features the P&T doesn't.

I Will Stare from the Window.

Don't think there was anything particular to look at but they seemed engrossed nevertheless.

Carrying a Message

I spotted this sign when we went to visit Chatsworth the other week. I know how they feel :)

No More Than a Baby Feeding Swans on the River

The other week we went along to an open day at one of our local manor houses. We all enjoyed a walk around the house and a stroll in the grounds. Olivia made a new friend...

Full of Love and Comfortable in Themselves

Here are the girls enjoying themselves in the park. They go most weekends but the novelty still has not worn off, particularly with Gracie who, danger baby that she is, loves going high.

We have been to these places for barely a moment

Grace continues to change so quickly. She is really steady on her feet and normally coasts round the furniture holding on with just one hand. She still gets down on to the floor and crawls when she meets an open space so the next step is for her to walk hands free. I think she will probably just get up and do it one day.

The girls get on so well. Olivia loves to give Gracie bear hugs and do stuff like wrap her up in a blanket and roll her around the floor and Gracie just laughs like a drain and thinks that 99.9% of everything Olivia does is hilarious. My job now is to try and get Olivia to recognise the other 0.01% and stop putting Grace in to a headlock! Olivia really loves her little sister and very earnestly told me the other day 'Mummy, Gracie is my favourite toy.' I pointed out that Grace is a baby and not a toy and she thought a bit more and then announced 'Gracie is my best friend and Daddy is your best friend'. She is so super cute!

Olivia is very clever and also very opinionated. She certainly tells you what she does and doesn't want to do. Anyone would think she was two and a half or something! This evening she screamed hysterically for about 25 minutes due to a combination of not having a daytime nap and being by Mummy told to stop swinging on Grandma's cupboard doors. She was a small slice of hell for a good while.

Thing is that being a parent can be hard but the good stuff outweighs the bad. When Olivia smiles naturally, not the silly screwed-up eyes smile she does when someone puts a camera on her, but the natural smile when she genuinely thinks something is funny, she melts my heart.

We've Been Taken on a Very Long Ride

Here is Olivia on her bike. She is still rubbish, doesn't peddle and wants to get off after about 10 seconds but she does seem to enjoy it while she is there.

Stories That I Never Told

Well, apologies to anyone who's been checking back to see whether we've updated the site and has concluded we've all carked it from Swine Flu.

We're still sorting out the new kitchen - though it is the very last few bits now. It has taken inordinately longer than we anticipated, and we anticipated it would take longer than the builders said it would. Things have not been helped by our flooring supplier falling victim to the recession, necessitating a refund and starting that side of things off again from scratch...

Grace is doing very well. She learned to crawl about three weeks ago and now whizzes across the floor and pulls herself up on the furniture. She has a face and head covered in small bruises from all the tumbles she's taking and despite the same thing happening with Olivia, when K___ took Grace to see the health visitor for a check up, there was a tiny niggle that worried that they might think something was awry.

In the last few days, Grace has started talking. Her first 'word' was 'Dadadadada', which I know almost certainly doesn't mean 'Daddy', but anything and nothing. It was followed a day later by "Nananan" and yesterday, "Mumumum", and that really did appear to be directed at K___.

Olivia continues to do well with her potty training. She's dry all day now, and we've taken off the sides of her bed to allow her to get out and use the potty during the night too. Unfortunately, this means that at the moment we're experiencing quite a lot of night time messing about. In the week that she's had the new bed (with Balamory duvet set, no less) she's come into to our room at least once a night. Here's hoping that stops soon...

Here's some pics from my camera phone last Thursday - apologies that the quality isn't better.

Dry Land

On Wednesday morning Olivia weed on Mummy's living room carpet. This must have had an impact because she has been dry ever since (including nap time). She is in nappies over night but it seems like we have broken the back of it as far as daytime goes. Yay!

Tries and Fails and Tries Again

Olivia is trying big girl pants for the first time today. She had just one accident (although she did go back into a nappy for her afternoon nap) all day.

Just now, as we tried* to get the girls to sleep, I listened to an interview with the British Psychologist Richard Wiseman on the Skeptic's Guide to the Universe podcast (Episode 204 circa 54:50). Wiseman is promoting a new book, The 59 Seconds: Think a Little, Change a Lot about scientifically sound ways to improve your life. It's like a self-help book only with the key difference that it contains claims that are based on proper research and which actually work, rather than some load of woo pulled out of someone's arse. When asked for an example of the kind of thing that's in the book, he mentioned the idea that you shouldn't praise achievement but effort.

Rather than saying, "Well done, you kept your pants dry all day!" we should be saying, "Well done for trying so hard to keep your pants dry today!" The rationale is that if you praise achievement, the next time they will be scared to put themselves in a position where they fail to win the praise, whereas if you praise the effort, they can always try regardless of actual achievement. Essentially, effort is a variable that is within the child's grasp to control, achievement is not. Not only is this the case, but children brought up to believe that it is achievement that is important actually learn to discount effort; "If I can't achieve it by my natural talents, it reflects poorly on me." Clearly this is a very poor message to communicate to a child!

I'm not pretending this is Earth-shattering stuff - in fact, it seems bloody obvious once it's explained - and nor is Wiseman. What he is saying is that it may be easy but it's actually not very well known. It was pure coincidence that it just so happened that I ended up listening to this podcast on the same day Olivia started wearing big girl pants, but it did make me make a mental note to check exactly what I say to her.

In other news, Grace has two teeth, lower central incisors, with her eye teeth and one upper incisor clearly budding in her gum. Oh, and the kitchen is starting to look much better, though it's difficult to imagine how it can all come together in just three more days...




* and largely failed. K___'s still up there at nearly 9o'clock at night. How do the little sods know when you're trying to get them down early? Oh well; they're normally pretty good these days.

In the Kitchen with your Dreams

The following is by way of lame excuse for the fact we've not posted much recently. We've been gearing up for a bit of major work on the house, specifically the kitchen, including a new extension. K___ has been collaborating with A_____ our next door neighbour, who is a property developer by trade. A______ has got us some amazing discounts and we're getting our new kitchen for a fraction of the retail price.

The old kitchen and utilities are out and stacked up in our dining room awaiting collection after sale on eBay, the new kitchen is stacked up in my study

Here's what it looked like until earlier today, with all the old units stacked in the breakfast room:

In the next one, you can see into the lobby, which opens into the utility room and the stable door to the outside.

As you can see from the final snap, the lobby has been demolished.

We've got about two weeks of this left. We're eating as well as we can using just a microwave and the ground floor looks like nothing on earth, but it's going to be worth it.

Apes Like You and Me

We were inspired by a story about some new captivity-born penguins on the local news to visit Twycross Zoo on the Leicestershire/Warwickshire border. Twycross actually specialises in primates, and they have many species including Bonobos (the only breeding population in the UK), Chimps (some of whom were in the famous PG Tips adverts), Gorillas, Orangutans, Tamarins and Langurs, as well as a few standard zoo animals.

We knew that the Elephants were due to be fed just a few minutes after we'd got there, so we immediately raced up to the far end of the park. En route, we passed the giraffe enclosure. Olivia knows what giraffes look like - she sees them in books and on television - but when a young female strode out of the 'stable', she was literally shaking with excitement, all sharp intakes of breath and lots of pointing. They are magnificent creatures and I'm sure to see them through a child's eyes is something else.

At this point I have to apologise for the lack of pictures. Unfortunately, when we took out the camera and tried to take our first snap, we realised we were practically out of batteries and it wouldn't extend the lens. It took a while to get back to somewhere that sold new ones, so the pics are all from the tail end of the day (pun intentional).

I think my favourites were the Bonobos. Bonobos are an endangered sub-species of Chimpanzee found only in the Democratic Republic of Congo. They're smaller than your standard chimp and seem to be (there is some controversy) matriarchal, and possibly because of this, very much more peaceful than chimps and more egalitarian. They're also phenomenally sexually active, with sex being used as a part of all sorts of social rituals. These beautiful creatures share so much of their DNA with humans (at least 98% and possibly as high as 99.4%) that some biologists have argued that they should be classified as a part of the Homo genus, along with us (yet others argue it is us who needs to be reclassified into the Pan genus of Bonobos and Chimpanzees).

It was interesting that when we were in the Bonobo house, Olivia was very interested in the apes yet when we found their close relatives, the common Chimpanzee, she found them intimidating and when a baby poked its finger towards the glass where she was looking, she burst into tears. I was particularly interested in a father and son pair of chimps with alopecia (and not just because I'm bald too). As it's not my pic, I'm only going to link to a photo of the son, Jambo. Although chimps are very heavily muscled compared to us, you can clearly see that we're related.

Olivia particularly loved the penguins. As you can see, their tank has a cut-down side and you can go and watch them swim past underwater. They clearly reacted to Olivia's presence as the rest of the time they weren't going quite so close to the glass. Despite the news story, the new chicks were nowhere to be seen, by the way.


You can barely see it, but there's a leopard languishing on top of the platform in this shot.


Here we are outside some of the monkey cages. I believe that's a pair of Black and White Colobuses in the background.

Like a Star in the Sky

As I was eating my dinner the other evening, Olivia knelt in front of Grace and grabbed her by the arms before singing nursery rhymes to her. I managed to capture a bit on my phone. It's poor quality and cuts out halfway through, but I thought it was charming anyway.

Warm Wet Circles

Update on Olivia's potty training... We have kept everything low key but Olivia seems to have decided to potty train herself. Since the weekend we got her started she has started to ask to be taken to the toilet and on average once a day she actually does something while she is there. She is still wetting a lot and we are continuing to keep her in pull up nappy pants. Someone said to me last week 'my mother always used to say that you never see a bride walking down the aisle wearing a nappy'. We are going to continue to leave her to do it in her own time.

The Tower

Tattershall Castle, near Sleaford in Lincolnshire is a 130 foot high, six-storied Tudor keep owned by the National Trust. It was built in the 1430s by Ralph, 3rd Lord Cromwell on the site of an even earlier castle. After centuries of declining fortunes, in 1911, it was rescued from being sold off to an American syndicate that intended to asset strip it and sell the antiques and features in the States. Lord Curzon, former Viceroy of India, intervened and restored the castle to its current condition.

We popped up there one Sunday and spent a few hours climbing the many stairs and being buzzed by a Spitfire and a Dakota from the nearby Battle of Britain Memorial Flight.



In one room, they had volunteers demostrating things like a selection of children's toys and a collection of Tudor haute couture. Olivia chose a Jester's hat, which either means she's into early Marillion (entirely possible) or is one of those people call Mungo at a micro-festival who think they're being weally alternative...


As pictured below, there was a woman demonstrating how to spin wool. K___ and I naturally assumed that Olivia was too young to have a go, but the Tudor maiden insisted she would be fine. The first task was to pull loose clumps of wool through a fine-toothed comb to untangle them and to align them in the same direction. It was harder than you might think and when you're informed that girls not much older than Olivia would have been expected to sort several bags of wool a day, you get a reminder of how pampered we are today. You can see the teased wool in the wicker basket.


The next stage is to take your teased fibre and pull it into a longer thread. It's still loose at this stage and would soon fall apart without spinning. Spinning it literally twists the fibres onto themselves so they hold together, with new individual pieces of wool continually wound into the whole along its length. Olivia wound her string onto a small piece of card and brought it home with her.


Olivia was extremely well behaved on the narrow staircases and we were able to investigate the whole castle, right to the top from where you can see Lincoln some ten miles away.

Appeal for Information on the Local News

And news just in... a little bit of Photoshop silliness from my sister.

Happiness is the Road

A small rant...When I didn't have children I used to dash across the street in any gap. Now I have kids I am trying to set a good example and cross on proper crossings like a proper grown-up. We are teaching Olivia about road safety and we always play a game where she has to tell me when she sees the green man at crossings before we can cross.

Now on to the rant. What was wrong with crossing that beeped at you when the traffic light when to red and it was safe to cross? With the new generation of silent crossings I can happily stand there for hour in a dream world waiting for the already green man to go green, only to discover that it has gone back to red again. Why can't they beep? Why, oh why?

Memory of Water

On Saturday we started 'toilet learning' (the right on expression used by our bible, 'What to Expect: the Toddler Years') with Olivia. She is now 27 months and for some time she has been very interested in what is in Grace's nappy, following Mummy to the toilet etc. but has not shown enormous interest in using the potty . While I am not into competitive parenting, the fact that several children her age at her toddler groups have been out of nappies for several months made me wonder whether we shouldn't try moving her along a little. Yesterday we got her some Disney Princess pull up nappy pants with flowers which vanish if she wees the nappy and encouraged her to tell us if she needed a wee.

She didn't seem to mind sitting on the potty and happily sat there while watching an episode of something special or reading a book with Mummy but didn't actually go to the toilet and would wait until you took her off the potty and then wee her nappy. This got a little frustrating and she was obviously picking up on our mood and so today we persevered in reading her potty related story books and have kept everything very low key, telling her that if she wanted to use the potty she could but that it didn't matter if she didn't want to.

Our plan was to leave it another week and try again. This afternoon we were sitting together when she suddenly said 'Mummy, I want to go to do a wee wee on potty'. We had put her in a nappy today as we were not expecting her to show any interest but we quickly stripped her off and popped her on the potty. After a few minutes of sitting there she stood up and said 'look Mummy' and had indeed done a wee wee. We gave her big cuddles and told her she had been very clever. We are still going to leave things pretty low key and see how it goes if we leave her to her own devices for a bit.

She also got to play in her Night Garden play tent, which we had brought her as an incentive to use the potty (she gets to play in it every time she successfully uses the potty). She wanted Grace to play in it with her and so here are the little monkeys.

Not Just the Taste, the Touch, the Smell

An update on how Grace's weening is getting on... She has got on very well with the finger food and so we are doing very little in the way of spoon feeding and she is self-feeding instead. So far she LOVES sesame rice cakes, with or without organic cream cheese. Broccoli is another firm favourite. pears get wolfed down and she also likes breadsticks a lot. It is amazing how much her hand-eye coordination has come on in the last few weeks. I was cynical when I first heard about baby-led weening but our experience with both kids has certainly been that 6 month old babies can indeed feed themselves.

A Hair Falls Out of Place

Here is Olivia on a recent trip to the hairdressers. Unlike last time I took her, where she wriggled about in the chair like a sack of snakes, this time she sat very nicely and let the stylist cut her hair. Apols for the quality of photos as they were taken on my mobile.

Thankyou Whoever You Are

I'd like to say a big hello to our newer readers - welcome to the blog. Also in case you are sitting wondering what the are rambling on about I should also say that all the titles of our posts are song titles or lyrics from the very excellent Marillion. Daddy M and myself met through a mutual friend and a mutual love of this band and so we owe them big. This is just our little way of paying a daily homage.

For those newbies who haven't already come across it then I'll give a big up to a long time reader and fellow blogging Mum (or I guess as she is across the water 'Mom') Lainey Paney. Her blog is entertaining and thought provoking and has at various times made me laugh and cry. Get out there and read her!

Now I need to find some time to get out there myself and read some of the hundreds of other blogging Mummies out there...

There's No Use Trying to Pretend

Olivia is now 27 months. I have noticed in the last few months that Olivia's imaginative play is really starting to come on. She loves making pretend drinks and snacks for all the family, normally accompanied by the words 'want coffee tea Mummy?'

She has also started to look after her toys like they were babies. At the moment every time Olivia needs a nappy change, Iggle Piggle also has to have a nappy change. She puts him down on the table and I have to pass her a series of imaginary nappy changing items. It is like she is the surgeon and I am the scrub nurse - 'wipes...cream...nappy'. Once Iggle Piggle has had his nappy changed he has a bottle of imaginary milk and then settles down with his imaginary dummy. Olivia likes to put him in Grace's car seat and rock him to sleep.

Olivia is also getting very good at recognising colours and shapes. Mum and I read her books or play games which involve her recognising colours and shapes throughout the day to reinforce what she has learned.

She is also getting very good at remembering the words to songs. She sings Twinkle Twinkle very well, although she thinks it is hilarous to sing it to Gracie along the lines of 'Twinkle Twinkle little baby'. She also does a fine line in half remembering the words to songs and making up the bits she doesn't know - we call it the jazz remix!

Out of this World

Today I have been exploring the world of blogging Mummies.

Here are a few of the things I have joined:

http://britishmummybloggers.ning.com/
http://mombloggers.ning.com/
http://mumbloggersclub.ning.com/

She Comes with the Sunlight and the Perfect Summer Days

Today was such a lovely sunny day Olivia decided she wanted to 'have picnic Mummy, picnic with my friends'. So Mummy prepared a host of teeny-tiny goodies and Olivia had a lovely time.

And Making a Mess While You’re Trying to Clean

This week we started weaning with Grace. Can't believe it but she is 6 months on Sunday. Despite being a wee little dot she is a very hungry baby. She stopped sleeping through the night a few weeks ago. I tried increasing her milk feeds....still hungry. I tried giving her the hungry baby milk...still hungry. The problem is that she wasn't really all that fussed about drinking more milk and so it was an uphill struggle to get her to eat enough to keen her going now she is getting more active. As she was approaching 6 months deciding to wean her wasn't a problem, but what would be an issue was the choice of weaning method.

You may remember that when we weaned Olivia we went with baby-led weaning. The problem we face with Grace is getting enough down her for her to be satisfied. With baby-led weaning you continue the normal milk feeds until the child is eating enough food and then start to reduce the milk as the food intake goes up. Problem was that Grace wasn't that fussed about drinking enough anyway. So, we have decided to do a mixed approach with Grace. She is self-feeding but is also having some spoon feeds of lumpy food. Her first meal was toast, which she really seems to love. She has also tried pasta, breast sticks, rice cakes, carrot, broccoli and banana whole and then various things I have cooked up for her such as sweet potato and lentil.

She seems much happier in the day time and is sleeping better during the night.

Monkeys Trying to be Stars

Here are my gorgeous girls. A pair of lovelies I am sure you will agree!