Sickness

The last two weeks have been a horror for us all, with gastroenteritis and a flu knocking the kids and me all about. I spent several nights running between Zoe and George dealing with their various outputs. Urgh. This is certainly the time that tests all of your parenting skills. Being terribly sick myself hasn't helped, but I also haven't been able to stop and wallow (much as I want to!).

All this illness has meant that I could not visit baby Thomas, the new baby of Litsa and Donald (Ewan's brother), for several days after he was born 3 weeks premature on 16 October at Murwillumbah Hospital, after poor Litsa spent several days in labour.

Being up all night every night has given me plenty of time to think about an offer to participate in a cashless gambling forum in Toronto in December. This just seems an opportunity too valuable to miss, and I hope it will give me some impetus to move my PhD studies forward (at some stage!). Once I had decided to go, I agonised for weeks about whether to take some or all of the family with me, but they will all stay here. Ewan will take time off, and Dad/Pa will come up from the Central Coast with his parter, Julie (a nurse and ex-midwife) to help care for the kids. So now my mission is to pump and freeze as much breast milk as possible.

I'll try to post some pictures of our now 9 weeks old baby boy in the next few days.

New baby news

Great news from Erica, Noah and Maya yesterday, who have welcomed Solomon, their son and brother, into the world. We are very excited that George will have a playmate so close to his age, and that Erica and Noah have completed their beautiful family. Our best wishes to them at this lovely time.

Other new baby news is that Aunty Sheona and Uncle Ronnie are 3 months pregnant. They announced this and their recent marriage in Las Vegas to us all last week. Congratulations to them both.

On the home front, things are not quite as much fun. I have been up all night with poor George, who is having trouble with a cold. It's possible he's sicker than that, as Zoe was throwing up all night and day on Monday, and now has runny poos. The joys of motherhood.

This photo is an example of what happens when you leave your 2 year old and baby together, while hanging nappies on the line. Could have been worse than a couple of toilet rolls I guess!

Childcare

Another great program from Insight on SBS this week, that considers paid maternity leave (I'm very grateful to have that support while off with George) and the impacts of childcare. Thankfully, quality family daycare was rated quite well in comparison to long centre based care.

Click on this blog's title 'Childcare' to view the program.

Sleep

We have had some success encouraging Zoe into her own bed in her own room, although we stick to our routine of reading 3 books and staying until she falls asleep. Thankfully, she now also allows Daddy to do this, which frees me up to settle George, something that happens about every two hours, until 3am ish, at which point he becomes really unsettled and grunts and groans and moans until daylight. Sometimes, I just stay up with him at this point, depending on how 'energetic' I'm feeling, as bringing him into bed with us doesn't necessarily settle him. Ewan is a bit more distressed by his seemingly permanently uncomfortable state than I am, but I reassure him that it will - hopefully - pass. I've tried to cut back on the amount of dairy in my diet, as there is some evidence this can be a problem for some babies. I probably don't really believe this is the cause of his crying, but I guess I wanted to try to do something to help George out and relieve his pain.

The community health nurse of course ignored me when I told her what I was doing, and decided instead that the problem was the muesli that I eat. That woman! She's also advised me to string his feeds out due to his rapid weight gain (almost two kilos in five weeks). I don't believe a word of it, but didn't tell her that. I only went in the first place as there was some concern that George might have an umbilical hernia, which seems to have either improved or wasn't there in the first place - hard to tell from the way she doesn't answer my questions

Anyhow, I really only sat down to post some more photos, including one of Zoe taken by Sue, and one of George and his Pa, who visited for a week to help out with the kids.