Germ Bags

Imagine, for a moment, that you have an annoying cough and cold. A virus which makes you wheeze, sneeze, and struggle to breathe. With that, add a forever refilling snotty nose and painful sinuses, on and off blocked up ears which come with dizziness. Also throw in a fluctuating temperature and tiredness.

If I was at work...I'd be at home resting watching 'Can't Cook, Won't Cook' awaiting the return of my lovely husband with a pile of lemon and blackcurrant menthol medicines.

However, this time, life is a little different. Baby comes first, your germs come second. It's hard on your own though. Every task requires much more energy than you actually have.

Coupled with this, Drew's not been so easy lately. Off her milk and food, teary, clingy and sleeping for 30minutes at a time. I wasn't sure what it was, but she started coughing during the night and is now showing signs of catching my germs...poor lass.

Then there's the dog who needs to be walked, who spends the whole day either begging for attention or sleeping by the front door in case I try to slip out without him noticing. And this BLOG! It's tough to even think about lifting my fingers to type, let alone find anything humorous about feeling like a never ending bag of snot.

Waterbabies

We enrolled Drew in Waterbabies 5.5 weeks ago.

It's a 30minute weekly session held in a residential home's lovely warm swimming pool.

Babies have a real affinity with water, having spent their months in the womb suspended in fluid.

Apparently, as time progresses this confidence decreases. At between 10 and 15-months, babies can develop a fear of water if not already regularly exposed to it (source: Waterbabies website)

All babies have a ‘gag reflex’ - meaning they automatically hold their breath when their faces are submerged. This is at its strongest when they are under three months old but can be re-learned at any time through responding to voice commands. To see more photos CLICK HERE

Luckily, we've had no 'nappy accidents' as yet, but I'm sure if any baby will do it in our class, it will be Drew!

I'll keep everyone posted on Drew gets on as the weeks go by and see below for a short video of Drew in action...

SOLID POOH!

**WARNING - POOH SHOT**

Drew produced her first solid pooh!
There are many benefits of this:-

a) Less baby wipes used
b) Nappy can hold the pooh in with no leakage
c) It doesn't smell quite as bad as the 'mustard pate' version
d) If you drop it, it's easy to pick up

Isn't the human body a m a z i n g !!! Clever girl!!!

Have I got OCD?

Everything was SO much easier when it was just milk and bottles. I thought I'd never be so happy about sterilising bottles and preparing milk for Drew...until now. Now she's started needing more solid food. What a palaver!

Whereas most parents relish in this apparently magically developmental time, I'm wishing Drew would either go back to being 4months old again or secretly hoping she can jump this part of life and go straight to feeding herself. With a knife and fork of course. If she can actually prepare and cook the food too...even better!

I didn't realise how uneasy it makes me feel when I feed Drew something like sweet potato or carrots and broccoli and it either ends up ALL round her face and in her hair. I remember going to school when I was a sweet well mannered child, and I had long hair for the majority of my childhood, and finding that I had something stuck in it. Usually honey. My Dad had the same problem with his beard. His usually had marmalade in it.

Not only does it end up everywhere, but WHY OH WHY would A N Y O N E want to put their fingers in their mouth WHILST there was mushed up veggies in there and push them in far enough that it makes them gag, making the mushed veggies PLUS more come back out, resulting in a baby gasping for breath, red watery eyes and who is still hungry. Another one is that she likes to stab herself with the spoon which Drew plays with while I'm trying to feed her. In Drew's defence, she's pretty good at aiming the spoon into the mouth, but she doesn't know when to stop, so it hits the back of her throat and again, she gags and looks at me as if to say 'What have you done to me?'

I never thought I had OCD though. I'm not one of those bonkers people who MUST have their cans or jars all facing forwards, or washes their hands a zillion times a day, or even switches a light switch on and off, on and off, on and off. Mind you...I do remember when I was much younger and walking home from school, if I coughed, I would always have to cough to make it an even number of coughs. Or if I tripped or scuffed my shoe, I would have to do the same with my other foot. Now THAT'S bonkers right? It made the journey home quicker though.

Also on the way home from school, I also sometimes pretended I wasn't making my legs move, but I was sitting in my forehead looking out through my eyes and moving all manner of levers and knobs to make the legs and feet move like a robot...yes. I know what you're thinking. I'm odder than you originally thought and you don't want me near your children. Well...its funny, but apparently, my Dad used to have the same thoughts on HIS way home from school when he was a youngster. I couldn't believe it....he was young once???

Well, back to the OCD behaviour. If you've ever wondered if you have OCD, if you check out the OCD Centre website and visit their homepage, you'll want to have OCD, let me assure you!...have a look!