Sleep Glorious Sleep

Oh my darling Lucy! You are good to me oh so good to me. We've been enjoying a decent nights sleep for over a week now. At first I thought nah this is just a once off. You must have been tired. But as it turned out you repeated your sleeping trick the next day.. and the next.. and the next... this was when i started to think wow perhaps you're really into this sleeping through the night thing! Oh my gosh a sleeping baby at 11 weeks this seems to good to be true. No a week and a half later I'm rejoicing in the fact that this is happening and sleep is once again so soon something I'm able to enjoy.

Lucy is sleeping so well day and night. she has her dreamy feed at 10/1030pm and it's good night until Abey wakes us up in the morning. loving it! so appreciating it! and hoping and praying that the change in location doesn't throw her off entirely!

Two months!

Would you believe it?! Just like that Lucy has made it to 8 weeks. She's losing that newborness and is starting to smile. And she has grown, boy how she has grown! We went to the doc today for her 8 week check up and first lot of jabs. The scales came out, Lucy went on and the magic number today was 5.96kg and 61.5cm long! Abbey by contrast at 9 weeks was 5.65 and 58cm. So Lucy Little ain't so little!

Life is going well in the world of mum dad and two kids. We have good days and not so good of course but we get there. Ryan is the star husband and this week has already cooked 5 meals. Lucky for me he enjoys cooking and so doesn't see it as too much of a task after a full day at work. Anyway his meals are often much nicer than what i serve up so it's all good. Sometimes it's just easier for me to do the bedtime routine with the girls but often we tag team. I find if i don't start organising dinner late arvo though it just gets a little busy and my head can't cope. We've started to push Abbey's dinner a little later and she's had some meals with us eating the same as us which makes life easier too. She eats a little better also when we're all sitting down doing the same thing.

Abbey is learning more words each day. I've been meaning to keep track of Abbey's vocal development but like all good intending parents it's been one of those things that sadly I have thought of often - even purchased the little notebook to write them down in - but not actioned.

Abbey's words are still few but we get by quite well. She certainly understands a heck of a lot more than she can communicate obviously. Now when I say that she can 'say' these words I mean she either says it clearly and Joe Blogs would understand her or that she makes a good attempt and enough that we understand her. Just recently she's also started signing 'bird' and 'finished' which were two of the baby sign words i have taught her. Now I'm kicking myself for not teaching her more!

The latest on the list are:
She comprehends full complex sentences on many occasions. I remember the day i said to her "can you put that in the rubbish please" - indicating to the item on the ground and she picked it up and took it to the bin and put it in. I didn't even know she knew what a rubbish bin was!!

Understands:
chin
elbow
Lucy
potty
shoe


Says:
Amen
kiss
fart (bet daddy taught her that one!)
it's ok (to Lucy when she's crying)
Mum
Dad
Bottle - 'Bo'
More Please! - 'Mor ... and then a word for 'please' I can't work out how to write!
Thank you - 'Tank koo'
Dog
bird
pool
teeth - 'teh' when she wants to brush her teeth
spoon
plane - there's an action for this too! She waves one arm up and down. No idea where she got it from but she's consistent.
car - 'Ca ca'
poo - 'poooooooooooooooo!' although she says this every time we change her nappy no matter what the contents!

Oh and on that note... Abbey has now on two separate occasions used the potty of her own accord!! I take her nappy off sometimes in the day so she can air out the nether regions and i said to her if she needed to do poo that she needed to sit on the potty. We were in the lounge and then she left and i heard her in the bathroom and went to investigate thinking she was probably getting into the cupboards. There I find her holding the potty having just emptied the contents into the toilet! The next morning prior to a shower she sat on the potty and deposited without being told to and later in the day weed! She did on that occasion proceed to tip it on the floor but i praised her for doing it in the potty first. Wee in the potty was a moment to be celebrated!! I am such a mum!! The pride! The joy! These are important achievements no matter how dirty the subject. I was ready to shout it from the roof tops! So I shall continue to give her nappy free time and hope we have more positive results.


As I mentioned Lucy has just started to smile which is great. So need that positive feedback some days! She's in a good routine now and is feeding well and at night from 1030pm we're getting through t0 4am before the next feed. Hopefully that will start stretching out little by little. during the day there's about an hour of overlap with their sleeps. Some days Lucy sees it as her chance to have me all to herself and wakes up 20mins after Abbey has gone to sleep. Today though I've had an hour and 15mins as Abbey was exhausted and went for her nap earlier. Hence the opportunity to chuck some pics on here and update you all.


This weekend just past we went on our first family adventure. Real adventure! We got in the car and drove for about 2hrs south to a place called Mission Beach. Now it wasn't the type of day for going to the beach as it was raining so we decided to go for a walk. There's a place called Clump Mountain National Park which had a circular track. So we donned our jackets and had Abbey in the backpack with rain cover and Lucy in front pack under Ryan's jacket and off we went into the rain forest! Great thing about the rain forest canopy is that it's a fabulous shelter so although we got wet we weren't getting pelted with rain. And it was great fun. All the motion must have got Lucy's bowel a moving though as Ryan got wafts of a certain package as we walked. When we got back to the car we discovered the mighty deposit that it was all the way up her back but thankfully and miraculously well contained with none escaping down the legs or through her top too much so the front pack didn't get too dirty. I tell you what I should carry Abbye more often to walk off this post baby weight that lingers. 10kg extra makes a big difference. Ryan normally carries her but he had a bigger jacket which we needed to cover Lucy and he doesn't fit mine. I think I did pretty well actually.
Now that the calender has flipped to February we're pretty much in count down mode. Our packers arrive one the 20th Feb and we're out of here that weekend bunking in with Mikaela and John and John. It will be a squeeze but we'll look at it as a great time for family bonding and a true blessing to have somewhere to stay before we leave. Ryan finishes up at work that last week of Feb so we have the first week of march to tie up loose ends and enjoy family before flying out on the 6th March. It's a bit surreal some days to think we're heading back to NZ for good. It will probably just feel like a trip home for a few weeks. Really looking forward to seeing those familiar faces and all the not so familiar little faces, the kiddies, who have joined the lives of our friends and family since we left. Well that, my friends, will have to be it for today. I've uploaded all the decent photos we have. Lucy has loads less by far than Abbey. Second child, less time. But hopefully we're capturing enough to keep you interested.

A few pics

Abbey having just woken from her nap joining Lucy who is still napping

Abbey ready to help with the washing. She likes to hold one handle of the washing basket when we put the washing out. She used to hand me the pegs too but that phase seems to be over.

Lucy our super baby now 5 weeks old. time sure does fly by! I realised today how few photos we have taken of her.

She now weighs 5.1kg and is 57.5cm long.

She's sleeping pretty well though is keeping us awake with her grunting some nights. Last night Ryan declared that she will have to move into another room if she keeps it up. Daddy needs his sleep.Here she is enjoying her book from Aunty Michelle and Uncle Damian and Sophie. A little research too on those things called sheep which apparently there are a lot of in this country her parents call 'home'.

This is a photo of Abbey having some fun with shaving cream. We've had a lot of rain and were stuck indoors and my sister reminded me of this great indoor activity. Shave play! just let them draw in it and squeeze it through their fingers. Easy to clean up and they smell great afterwards! Abbey loved it.

3 Weeks... almost 4.

Time continues to tick along and with it Lucy starts to lose her newborness and is chubbing up nicely on some good home brand milk. I have no idea how much she weighs now as with Christmas and New Year holidays there's not been the opportunity to weigh her again so that's on the agenda for this week.

I'm loving the snuggley cuddly time with little Lu. It's so nice to have her floppy little self snuggle in and sleep so soundly on my chest. I hope it lasts. Abbey seemed to grow out of it so quickly and hasn't been big on cuddles since. She does treat us every once and awhile and she and I usually sit down and have a little cuddle just after she's woken up from her midday sleep but other than that she's usually too much on the go to stop and snuggle.

Abbey continues to be intrigued by Lucy. She seems to understand who she is and if I ask her if Lucy is awake or where Lucy is she will go and look for her in the cot or in the rocker. She's been pretty gentle with only to odd thump or slap. Lucy is very tolerant of her older sister. And Abbey still plants spontaneous kisses on Lucy which is just lovely to see. Here they are having some play time together though I think Lucy has nodded off again. Abbey must have been practising her counting and it all got a little boring. Christmas morning was delightful with us all piling into bed in the morning. Abbey really enjoyed opening presents. At one stage we wondered if it would be New year before she got through them all as she would rip a little piece of wrapping paper off and then hand it to Ryan to dispose of appropriately and then another little piece. Despite our encouragement of her to just rip into it she was very reserved to start with so we helped her along.

The Christmas/ New Year break has meant having Ryan at home again which has been wonderful for the girls. Lucy has woken up from her newborn slumber in the last week so it's been nice to have a bit more 'interactive' time with her. As you can see Ryan is clearly chuffed! That Elmo t-shirt seems to bring out his inner child =)

Getting the hang of juggling life with two children!Lucy's first bottle feed with dad. And the post milk drunken state. The title of this next photo according to Ryan is 'A rose between two thorns' HAHA!We've also had my little sister Angela visiting which has been fab and so nice for the girls to have some more Aunty time. Abbey missed out on all the relational cuddles with us being in the UK and so we're looking forward to them having more of it when we move back to NZ in March. Here they are at a wildlife park we visited getting friendly with a snake.Abbey is fast approaching the 18mth mark and is teaching us new things about herself and is absorbing more and more each day. She's getting a lot more assertive and at times a little stroppy when she can't have things her way. Usually it's got something to do with food. As in she goes to the pantry and wants you to get her something to eat and you won't. Or she gets given a biscuit and then wants another... and another ... and another. We've had to employ tactics to keep her out of the fridge now too. So far the little safety clip is working but she has tried to pull it off already!

Abbey has also picked up on "no". I'm hoping to catch her on video because it's quite funny the way she says it. It's not just the words but the facial expression and body language and matter-of-fact -ness that accompany it. No other developments in the vocabulary department but she continues to surprise me and how much she understands of what I say or ask her to do.

One of the things I do around meal times is pop her up on a stool next to me as I do the veges or bake. Recently we were baking a cake and Abbey has helping. She rather liked the chocolate mixture and got stuck in and then a little carried away resulting in some great face painting. There's a fantastic video on our facebook profile where she discovers that flour is not really that tasty on it's own and perhaps little finger should stay away!

We've also reached a stage where she's wanting to walk everywhere and not wanting to hold our hand. I've had to put my foot down at times with this one as obviously it's simply not safe. I may well end up buying kiddie reins so that she can still feel like she's going it solo but isn't.On a recent weekend away with Ryan's work we stayed in an old hotel which had a large staircase up to our room. Abbey hasn't had much experience with stairs thus far and decided that she quite likes them. Especially when we can count our way up and down them! Here we are on our hundredth decent down this flight when exploring the rain forest up Baron Gorge. At least she is willing to hold my hand on stairs!Basking in the cool shade while the rest of us take a dip to cool off.A little sisterly bonding..

Well that's all for now folks I hope you enjoyed the photos. Ryan is back to work today so I'm going solo again! I think I'm doing ok though it's currently 7:51am and both girls are up washed and dressed and Abbey is onto breakfast. And I have time to blog but have done none of the above myself! Must make myself presentable to the world.

One week on...

...and we're doing ok!

Now in the mornings it's four in the bed and that's delightful. Abbey snuggles up next to Lucy sometimes planting a kiss or two on her little cheeks and then devours her morning milk.

As you can see in this photo Lucy is looking a little jaundice but that's on it's way out now that milk is through and she's flushing out the system with it's goodness.

I've been trying to involve Abbey when I can and at least make sure she can see what I'm doing with Lucy. She was more than happy to help with bath time the other night which was very cute. She did her best to ensure that Lucy had a squeaky clean tummy.

Catching some Z's with dad.

Here's Lucy at one week old sound asleep. And no the blankets aren't because Cairns is going through a cold snap! It's been pretty hot and so we've had the air con on. She's been sleeping well and feeding well and doing all things well thus far! Last night she slept from 1030pm-330am-6am

Ryan is back at work now but it's been fab to have him home and I felt this morning that I was ready to go solo. Abbey has really enjoyed having him here. They've had lots of fun together in the pool getting up to all sorts or crazy things and just having a blast of a time really! Her swimming continues to come along amazingly. She now likes to go on her tummy with her face in the water 'swimming' without using her arms (hasn't quite grasped their use when swimming yet) with her head in the water, blowing bubbles with her eyes open!!

One handedTwo!

Great to see the father-daughter relationship flourishing. She wasn't too happy at nap time the other day when he had to go into work for the arvo and cried which is both sweet and a little difficult as there was nothing i could do. In the end I got her up for a while and then she went back to bed a little later. Abbey looking like a true Pom in her Man U outfit we bought for her a very long time ago and which finally fits! Amazing what you find when you clear out the wardrobe! Her football skills certainly need some work but I reckon she looks pretty darn cute in that gear!

Right time to feed!