Conrad’s blog

Already a week ago, one of my post-natal friends (from Conrad’s sister’s baby days) said the weather was going to be glorious yesterday, and – as we were discussing meeting up – she suggested us digging our paddling pool out. So that’s what we did and it turned out a fantastic day, with five other mums with kids coming over to ours for the afternoon, splashing about in the paddling pool, jumping on the kiddie trampoline, playing with the sand table and generally running around while the mums lounged in the shade of our gazebo.

I put Conrad in the little wet suit he’d been given for Christmas (!) for the first time, and it fitted him perfectly. The water in the paddling pool was a bit cold, which didn’t seem to deter the older kids, and as I didn’t really seem to get around to bringing out those buckets of hot water to sort the water temperature out, I decided to just risk it and plonk Conrad in too, preparing to fish him out straight away if he complained. But he didn’t at all: first time in the paddling pool, in his new swimming cossie and with five toddlers bundling about in the cool water around him, splashing him non-stop, and he just laughed.

I brought a couple of cartons of ice cream out a little while later for the kids, and Conrad got his first ever ice lolly, a blackcurrant 100% fruit juice one. He put the stick in his mouth almost as much as the lolly itself, the lolly broke in half, lots ending up on the grass and he made a sticky mess of a towel I put over his lap, but he seemed to enjoy it – every time he dropped it on the ground he picked it up and put it in his mouth again (usually, at the moment, he’s generally not very interested in finger foods, he mashes them between his fingers or in the palm of his hand but they very rarely come near his mouth…).

Today, without any other kids around, Conrad and his sister got the pool all to themselves and, boy, did they enjoy it!

(More piccies to come!)

Gabriella

Pretty much since Conrad moved in with Jessica, we’ve had a quite a few very early rises, with Conrad stirring around 5am, and waking his sister up too. Conrad stirs and starts to chat away to himself, and more often than not kicks the side of his cot as he rolls back and forth. But every so often we get a 6am one, which is fantastic – almost like a lie-in. Conrad seems chirpier throughout the morning for it (and his sister and Mummy aren’t quite as shattered either…!). Maybe it’s just wishful thinking, or just Conrad sleeping a bit more due to the cold he’s just had, but it seems somehow that the slightly later mornings have been a bit more common lately.

As soon as I come into the room and pull down the ‘black out’-blanket from the window, Conrad giggles at me and kicks his legs excitedly, and Jessica hops to her feet, point to his cot and goes ‘Dada vaken!’ with a big smile. I fetch Jessica out of her cot bed, sit Conrad up in his, open the window and straighten both their beds out (so they’re ready for the kids’ naps later in the day). And then I lift Conrad up and our procession of three make our way down the stairs with Jessica, clutching her bed toys, leading the way. Then Jessica, sitting on top of Conrad’s box of clothes in the bathroom, watches me wash Conrad and change his clothes and nappies before we go into the living room and sit down at the table for breakfast.

Conrad has two 1.5 to 2 Weetabix or Oatibix biscuits (on alternate days) with full fat milk and little bit of mashed banana. Jessica chooses his bib out of the two I’ve put on the table for them, which he seems quite happy with. After he’s had his cereal I offer him water in his sippy mug. If he wants to, he’s fine picking it up and drinking from it himself now, but the last week or two, he’s been more interested in blowing in the water, giggling as he makes bubbles in the water and it pours down over his chin and into the bib. He’s terribly cute with his big smile (when he smiles it’s with his whole face, his eyes light up and you can’t help smiling back and feel all warm inside) and then he giggles and kicks his feet and Jessica giggles too.

When Conrad plays he seems particularly interested in toys that make a noise – that is, musical noise. Some of his favourites seem to be Jessica’s drum, xylophone and swanny whistle – aside from all of his own and Jessica’s rattles, which he loves to shake (and still, not to forget, chomp). When he hits the drum and xylophone, it’s not to whack it as hard as he can, but makes quite a pleasant, melodic sound. He blows the swanny whistle really well, we think, for someone so little, and we were all really happily surprised when he managed to make a whistling noise come out of a star-shaped funnel (belonging to the outdoor sand table) by blowing into it. It amused us all when he did it first time, and it made him laugh and look very pleased too, and he seems to find it really easy to do it (although Ian and I have both tried to make a sound of it and failed miserably…!). So I guess we’re wondering a bit whether music might be his thing…?

It probably sounds too good to be true that Conrad laughs and smiles so much, but he really does. He gets cranky too, of course: when he’s tired, he loses interest in things much more quickly and grumbles if he’s not given attention; when he’s just about to have his breakfast (when I’m preparing it in front of him, even if he’s been perfectly happy up until that point) he starts to crank because it’s not in his mouth yet(!); sometimes when he falls over either out of surprise or because he’s bumped himself a bit. But he’s such an easy-going little boy, who seems to really be enjoying life – long may that last!

Only one month left until Conrad’s first birthday…

Gabriella

Bank holiday weekend and two kids’ birthday parties to go to! First one was yesterday, Conrad’s big sister Jessica’s friend Daisy turned two, and her parents were having a BBQ with cake. Weather was good for it: sunny, with a few clouds drifting past every so often, and a bit of a breeze. Conrad had had a morning nap, so he was cheerful, happy to walk about holding on to just one hand, or finger really, sometimes with Mummy, sometimes Daddy, and didn’t even mind just suddenly taking a couple of steps over to one of our friends, Jerry, grabbing hold of his hand and walking around with him for a while (until he spotted Mummy again…).

There were several children there, two actually younger than Conrad (Cameron, Daisy’s one-month-old brother, who spent most of the party asleep indoors, and Riley, a party guest at the tender age of 6 months, who snoozed away in his pushchair in the shade), and various trikes and toy bikes had been brought out into the garden. Conrad was especially keen on a battery-driven 3-wheel motorbike, which started up when one put ones feet on the foot rests (thereby pressing a switch on the right pedal) and then chugged across the grass. He even lent forward, tugging at the handles as if he was trying to rev the engine and make it go faster – so cute! I had to adjust the steering for him every so often, though, so he wouldn’t end up crashing into a table, chair or another child. At one point, when I was following him around and Daisy suddenly appeared and reached out for me to pick her up, he almost ended up in one of the flower beds! Luckily – in a way – the battery was starting to run a bit flat at that point, so he wasn’t making very quick progress and I managed to catch him up just in time.

Conrad had his milk, and then chomped on a bit of cucumber sitting in Daddy’s lap for a while, in the shade under a marquee. We tried to keep his sun hat on by tying it under his chin, but when he discovered that he couldn’t just lift the hat up to throw it on the ground, he started to pull it forward instead and made it slide off that way… Best policy is to keep him in the shade as much as possible, really.

In the evening, both Conrad and his sister were noticeably tired: they can both get a bit silly when they need bed and we ended up putting them in bed at 6.30, half an hour earlier than usual! Conrad had a bit of a restless night though, waking after only a couple of hours, restless in his cot, crying and pulling his legs up, almost as if he was having a tummy ache. When I picked him up, he stopped crying and slumped on my shoulder, still a bit restless until I’d sung for him for a while, when he started to nod off. As soon as I put him back in bed, though, he’d stir and start to cry again, and we’d start over. I gave him Calpol and a bottle of half formula half water, of which he gulped down 100ml. After about half an hour he calmed down enough to go back to sleep. Then he stirred again at about 4am, not crying this time, more a sleepy moan, on and off for about an hour. I didn’t hear either of the kids again after that until just before 7am, and then it was Conrad’s sister – Conrad himself was still sound asleep, curled up in the top right-hand corner of his cot, on his front with his head buried in the very corner. When he woke up maybe 15 minutes later, he was rested and cheerful.

Today, the party was at Wacky Warehouse, an indoors soft play area in a pub only a few minutes’ walk away from where we live. There we met up with Julia, whose little boy Daniel is turning one in a few days time, and her kids. While Jessica was running around, climbing and going down slides, Conrad played with plastic balls together with the birthday boy and, later, got near-buried in wave after wave of plastic balls by Mummy and Daddy, something which made him laugh and laugh – always a wonderful sound!

Back home not long after 12 o’clock noon, Conrad was a bit too tired for lunch, but had some pureed fruit and gnawed for a while on some Leksands-knäcke (cracker bread), and when put in his cot – even though he had hiccups – he fell asleep almost within minutes.

Conrad and his sister are in bed now, and hopefully tonight will be a better night’s sleep for both of them. Conrad’s suffering a cold at the moment, complete with cough and very runny nose, which can’t be helping matters. But he’s stayed happy throughout, so I’m sure he’ll be fine.

Gabriella