There’s Only One Callum Bun

Callum

My little big boy is really blossoming into a lovely person. He has slotted into school life with no effort at all. I’d heard of other children struggling with the first term and their behaviour deteriorating and if Callum had gone to school in September 2012 I’m pretty sure he would’ve been the same but being the oldest in his year at the start of September 2013, he was so ready. Stuart and I went to a parent’s evening before Christmas and the teacher was happy with where he was at. His learning progress wasn’t anything to wow about (every parent wants to hear their child is a genius and the top of the class) but he was where his teacher expected him to be…for a boy! One thing I was proud of was his behaviour. He would sit and listen and would stick with something he was asked to do until he was finished. The other thing was that he had lots of friends. That was enough for us to squash any concerns we may have had!

I’ve recently started to notice a real improvement in his reading. He brings home a couple of books a week from school and carefully sounds out the words but is needing less and less help. Likewise, his writing is getting better and less HUGE. When he sees his homework book, he always wants to write something in it. We rarely follow the requested homework (bad mummy) as it often asks for Callum to draw a picture of what he has done and Callum, although loves putting pencil to paper as if to draw, is no artist! He rarely draws a recogniseable picture and prefers to scribble anything and tell you its a picture of something. Instead, we practice writing and counting and maths. We do it during the course of the day as a natural thing but don’t always document it in his book as by the time I get round to writing in it, I’ve forgotten what it was we’ve done. I’m pleased that his school doesn’t push the homework too much and rather just encourages you to complete it at this stage and the tasks are set more as ideas – well that’s my interpretation!

When I think about Callum, more than his educational progress, I think about his character, loving spirit and what a wonderful big brother he is.

For example, he baked cakes at his after school club the other week and was allowed to take 2 cakes home early (before decorating as they had more than they needed) so he tells me one is for him and the other is for Millie. A couple of days later, he brings home three decorated cakes who he announces are for him, Millie and Daddy. He doesn’t expect to eat them all himself and I don’t prompt him, he wants to share with others. If he has a banana and Millie wants some, he’ll often share it with her.

Of course, he will often say he is ‘helping’ Millie with her toys as an excuse to play with them himself and will hog the ‘best toys’ regardless of who they belong to, to himself but he does interact with her and play with her. But Millie will always want whatever Callum is playing with.

It always amazes me how someone is brought into their life and they are not told to love this new intrusion but somehow they do and it is clearly evident how much Callum loves Millie. When I pick Callum and Millie up from nursery (his after school club is attached to the nursery), I pick up Millie first then Callum. It isn’t me he runs to hug hello, it is Millie! He genuinely cares for her.

In many ways, he is a typical little boy – he whinges, as I said in Millie’s post, he is a wimp when he bumps himself (tough love mother!), he tries to get out of washing his face and cleaning his teeth, he drags everything out to take so much longer than necessary, especially when you are in a hurry. He has already developed the teenager trait of not wanting to get out of bed on a school day and has uttered the words “I hate you” (to which I unhelpfully laughed!). He loves Superheroes and PowerRangers and spends far too much time on the iPad!

These posts of Callum and Millie aren’t meant as boasts of ‘look how wonderful my child is’ but as parents is it so wrong to be proud of your child and look for their good traits. I’m sure we tell them off and moan about them enough too so it is good to praise them and ourselves when what they are doing is right, surely?

It is easy to get caught up in the bad moments sometimes, and only see them but if you take a step back and look at the overall picture, I can’t help but be proud of how he is turning out and hope that it is as a result of Stuart and my parenting…somewhere!

Then I look forward to the years ahead – he is going to pay me back when he gets to his teenage years isn’t he!?

You may have noticed that I’m last in line for cuddles (I do get lots) and that I may not be the one he wants to share his cakes with but when asked “Daddy or chips?” he chose chips!

Callum in January VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Millie Moo, Look at You!

I've been observing Callum and Millie recently (as you do) and realised how quickly they are growing up! Thought it was about time I did an update here as before I know it the next entry will be of Callum starting work or Uni!

This post will be about Millie, the next about Callum.

 

Millie

Millie is properly toddling now. She is still so proud of herself. She pulls herself up from the floor and does her little zombie-style walk with her hands up in the air to balance her and her knees up to her elbows. Of course, like other little ones, before she has fully learnt to walk she tries to run and there have been a few face plants to the ground with the odd bloody lip but she bounces straight back.

[Children really do have more resilience and are much braver the younger they are - Callum is such a wimp now but used to be just as tough! But then Callum takes after his Daddy ]

Satisfied with the fact she can now toddle, her brain has switched to trying to speak mode - at last. With both children dragging their feet taking their time to do all the milestones I can't help beating myself up that I am the one holding them back somehow.

Anyway, Millie is focusing on certain words and things we say and trying to copy them. She says "goh" with her hands out for 'all gone' and she drops stuff (on purpose) and says "uh ooooh" for 'uh oh' which has moved on from purposefully dropping stuff and saying "no" while wagging her finger. She regularly says mumma and dadda and I'm pretty sure she knows what they mean but it is hard to tell. I try to get her to point to mumma and dadda in a photo or when we are there say "who's that" etc but she will rarely play along although nursery insists she does it with photos there.

We are trying to get her to ask for her dummy and muslin and she sort of says "dede" for dummy and "noonoo" for muslin but then she also says "noonoo" for anything she wants that is out of reach.

She loves pointing to our eyes and nose - and of course we love being poked in the eye and a sharp finger nail up the nostril!! On a couple of occasions now I have asked her where her own nose is and she has correctly pointed to it. Then if you say "clever girl" she will often start clapping.

So even if she isn't saying a hell of a lot, she is at least starting to understand words.

I was worried the other day when I read on a link (while researching at work) that a child of Millie's age should have a vocabulary of 10 words and I'm not sure she has that many but I've heard so many stories of children not speaking until they were 3 or 4 and then coming out with a whole sentence - Einstein being one of them, I think my brother-in-law was another. I’ve heard this is common for second children too as they have someone to speak for them or to get them whatever they point and grunt at. And, us as parents with our hands full and less time on our hands will go for the quick and easy option of just passing whatever it is they want rather than encouraging them to talk. So, in a nutshell, I've dismissed the worries, especially now she is showing an interest in learning to talk. I will endeavour to try to do the encouragement route rather than the easy one.

Millie loves books and will pick one up, turning the pages while babbling to herself as if reading the story. It's lovely to watch and hear.

She helps us (or often unhelpfully) dress and undress herself, putting her arms in the sleeves or arms up in the air to take off a top or pulls it off if you aren't quick enough getting it over her head. While doing the poppers up on her vest she starts trying to put her legs in her trousers. She also tries to put socks and shoes on...not necessarily her own!

She has a nose that permanently streams snot like lava from a volcano and detests you wiping it so will often sport a snake like skin across her cheeks as you try to wipe it and she frantically turns her head while making her distress known. 

She loves baths, happily splashing and swimming and she giggles lots when sharing a bath with Callum (though he likes to have the bath to himself). She also goes to bed very easily: pjs, grobag, milk and story, bed with dummy and mussie, Ewan the dreamsheep on, and off she goes - and usually wont wake until 7am ish. Though there is still the odd occasion of night wake-ups, usually due to teething or, like the night before last, just because she wants to party from 2.30 until 5am!!

I think Millie is going to be our little performer. She'll gravitate to a musical instrument, sing all the time to herself and loves to dance to the radio and mummy's cat squeals beautiful singing.

She is one little cheaky madam who can scratch your face just to see your reaction, throw a tantrum because you wont let her have chocolate for breakfast (another chocoholic in the family!) and she knows her own mind, for sure!

But what I love the most is how she smiles at you and you just can't help but smile back (even when telling her off). She is my (still diddy) little fairy.

Millie in January VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Walk this way!

She did it! She bloody did it! At 16 months and 22 days, she found the confidence to take those unaided steps! SHE WALKED!!!!

She loved it and got so excited at her new skill.

Millie found her feet quite young, she loved her legs and for months she has been making us walk all over the place while holding her hands. For this reason, we were convinced she'd be an early walker. But when no walking unaided, or even standing unaided, followed, we resigned ourselves that she was going to follow in her brothers 'last minute' footsteps. In fact I think she is a big tease! She leads you down a path that she will achieve a milestone early then it never materialises. She rolled when she was 12 weeks and then hardly ever rolled again. She took forever to bum shuffle and then started a half crawl, half bum shuffle around 14 months.

Now, with Millie being our second child, we have learnt that children will do things in their own time so we haven't been pushy or even wishing it along, we just wanted to be encouraging towards her next development but she would get us all excited and then never provide. My daughter is no 'completer-finisher' that's for sure! (sorry, you can tell I'm a trainer!)

Even though she was keen to walk around holding our hands, it took some time before she would trust using a walker. Then recently, she started pushing Callum's toy pushchair around with her baby in it which was a big improvement in her confidence.

We would try to make a game of letting go of her hands to see how long she would stand on her own but as soon as you would let go of her hands she would buckle her knees. Then recently she seemed to understand that the game was to half walk and half fall from us to the nearest object (like the sofa) and yesterday she seemed to want to play so I let go of her hands and she took a few steps into the room before falling on her bottom. Then, to my amazement, she tried to stand up on her own - I quickly got my phone out to start recording and this is what happened next:

Well done our clever Millie - no stopping her now. You have a very proud Mummy and Daddy!

Mojo, Where’d You GoGo?

With my return to work, I’ve kind of lost my blogging mojo.

It’s been a hectic and often stressful couple of months which feels like it is finally starting to settle down a bit now. However, after a morning of getting the kids out of the house on time and off to nursery/breakfast club, a full day at work often involving a 45min to 1.5 hour drive, then flying home to pick kids up, feed cats (and often kids), do the usual chores and then get kids to bed, the last thing I want to do is give away any more of myself.

I’m even a lot quieter on social media *thud* – I know, me -the prolific twitterer – did just say that!

I’m just not ‘feeling’ it. I don’t have the mind power to make casual chitter chatter. I loiter for a bit feeling like I’m looking in through the window at a party in full swing while I hover unsure outside in the cold. So then I often just close the laptop, pick up Wordhero on the phone and switch off to the outside world.

I do miss it though. I hope it will come back again soon.

Anyway, thought I’d provide a brief update on the family.

It feels like we have had a good couple of months of pass the bug, each having our share of colds, viruses etc. I’ve currently lost my voice (which is probably a relief to those in the ‘real’ world) and Millie has a lingering cough.

I’ll start with me and work. I feel like I’ve made a good impression and am proving my worth. Of course, there are insecurities occasionally, but I think that is natural especially with a new job and I think it is healthy to feel a little insecure otherwise you get cocky. I’ve received lots of good feedback from my line managers and other trainers which feels good. The project I’m working on is a bit chaotic, disorganised and, up until recently, a bit of a mess but think it hit a wall last week and positive steps are being made to turn the project around so I’m optimistic. It is all providing good experience and looks like my contract will probably continue past the end of March.

Millie is as cute as ever! Surprisingly, still not walking. After being so sure on her feet from quite early on, I really expected her to be running about by now. However, the bum shuffle has developed into a kind of monkey crawl with one knee crawling, one leg reaching forward like a bum shuffle and her arms propelling her forward.

She appears to say a few words but nothing clear enough to say for definite. I think the ones she can say are “no” while wagging her finger (similar to Callum’s first word of “don’t” while wagging his finger), Mumma, Dadda and Cat. She points at everything and knows how to get what she wants!

She generally sleeps well again now. There was a period over the summer where it was getting really tough and I thought she would never go back to being a good sleeper. She still occasionally wakes in the night but very quickly goes back off with the dummy being replaced and it definitely isn’t every night.

We’ve had Callum’s first parents….sorry Family Evening as it is now called.

Lots of good comments from his teacher about him being where she expects him to be reading and with making ‘marks’. He is very good at doing what he is told, sitting down and listening and continuing with a task until he has finished. He also has lots of friends which of course is nice to hear.

Taking him to the breakfast club and afterschool club at Millie’s nursery can often be cause for contention. He regularly says he doesn’t like Mini Beasts as the clubs are called (though he calls it Millie Beasts he he) and says he doesn’t want to go there despite him enjoying it when he is there. I think it is probably seeing his friends’ parents taking them to school and picking them up and he wanting us to do the same which pulls at the guilt strings a little.

Since his grommets being fitted and his adenoids were removed, his speech has come on leaps and bounds and his hearing is excellent now. His teacher said he does so well at school that she forgot he even had it done. He still misses off a  letter at the end of a word occasionally but he really listens if we correct him and tries to say words correctly.

With work, school, nursery etc there have been a lot of changes over the last few months so overall I think we are doing pretty well.

Now to be patient and await the return of my blogging mojo.

What Comes With Turning One!

Millie turned 1 year old and that brought with it a whole lot of hard work!

She is right at that age where life is all about frustrations. Wanting to walk but unable to do so without holding onto hands and refusing to attempt to use a push style walker (she wont go in the sit in walker anymore, probably because it is too big and she gets stuck too often). Trying to talk and communicate but not knowing the words or understanding the responses. Trying to have an opinion and be independent but not understanding why we wont let her go into the middle of the road, walk off a big step, why she must lay down for nappy changes or why we can’t be available on demand to walk her around the house holding our hands.

In addition to this, ever since we came back from holiday in June, for one reason or another (sleep regression, teething, illness) her nighttime wakings became exhausting! When she woke in the middle of the night she refused to sleep unless given milk and would sometimes wake up twice for milk and then another once or twice on top of that for her dummy.

I wasn’t liking the Onesie years very much and felt even more exhausted than ever before, never quite recovering.

For the walking, I have to remember that as much as my back is killing me now, it wont be forever and the more experience she gets the quicker the walking will come. I’m also trying to encourage her to use the walker (without much luck) and trying to improve her confidence walking with one hand or trying to get her to stand on her own, but I know she will do it in her own time.

But it’s not all hard work! I’m loving her development with talking. She can now say:

“Ta” – thank you
”No” while wagging her finger – however she treats this as a game and purposefully does something naughty so she can say “No” and wag her finger!!! Her particular favourite is throwing her dinner on the floor!
”eya” while waving – Hiya
”dada” – baby
”Yeah” especially when clapping

and she often copies the the noises and sounds she hears, whether it is imitating her brother, our tones of voices (something to watch if they are cross voices) or just short words we say. Such as tonight I was saying “open” as I opened a draw and “close” as I closed it and she copies the rhythm and tone of what I’m saying even if not getting the words.

Other very cute things she is learning are kissing and blowing kisses. She kisses her dollies and makes the kissing noise and action on her own but doesn’t kiss people yet. I did kind of teach her to blow kisses the other day. She kissed her hand then pointed at me . She pretends to read books and talk on the phone too. Just adorable!

It is so true when ‘they’ say children are sponges – the rate of learning at this age is incredible and I wish I could learn new things half as quickly (and I consider myself a fast learner!).

I start work next week and I go from being with her pretty much 24/7 (well except when she is sleeping) to handing her over to someone else to look after her from 8 until gone 6 (at least). Work is so the right thing for me but now I really appreciate that extra 6 months I had with Callum as there are so many firsts I’m going to miss and, yes, I’m gonna miss her like a crazy person!

At One!

Just where did the last 12 months go? It’s Millie’s 1st Birthday tomorrow and I can’t quite believe it. I’m not really one to get too sentimental and emotional about such things but I must admit it has hit me more than it did Callum and makes me go ‘gulp’!

With Callum, I hurried his baby days along always pushing him towards the next milestone & looking forward to the next phase of Callum. I wasn’t a fan of the baby phase and longed for more interactive stages. Looking back I was more stressed about doing things correctly and not getting into bad habits. I guess so many people are with the first child.

However, this time with Millie, I’ve relaxed into it and gone with Millie’s lead. Because my attitude has been different, I’ve enjoyed the baby stage so much more. Although I can’t wait to see what Millie is going to learn to do next I still look back with nostalgia.

But enough of that, lets look at the now!

Millie is still very quick to dish out the smiles at all & sundry and most of the time she is quite easy going but she is beginning to get a bit more of a spirited personality. She has always known what she wants but now she can get stroppy if she doesn’t get her way. This is especially true when it comes to walking around while holding our hands. Should we dare to ignore her desperate grabs for our hands as they pass by because we are busy with something else, or we tire of activity after the 14th cycle of the downstairs of the house, while rubbing our sore backs, she will cry like you’ve just taken her bottle away after the first taste of milk! Like I say above, she knows what she wants and while walking her around….I say walking her around but what I really mean is while she is walking you around because you really don’t get much say of where she goes.

We’ve tried persuading her the walker is a good independent way to practice her walking skills. She has use of a few. One which she sits in which she likes at first but gets frustrated with its size as she gets stuck occasionally and prefers to run me or the cats over with it! We also have one of those VTech walkers, the ones where you have lots of buttons to press & a phone on the front then a handle at the back which they can use to push it around. Similar to this, we have Callum’s old wooden blocks trolley walker. If we try to get Millie to walk with either of these latter types she freezes and cries.

Millie loves to dance and I think she is going to be the more musical out our two children.

She can clap and she can wave and just within the last week she can pretend to talk on the phone. Not that she says any recognisable words as yet but she holds it to her ear and babbles into it.

Millie now has 4 definite teeth and a 5th one has just broken through the gum and I believe there are a couple more that will be close behind.

She is rather speedy at the bum shuffling now and can be guaranteed to make a beeline for the top of the stairs giving Stuart and I many a heart attack as we don’t have a stairgate and she refuses to go down backwards! Think it is time to accept we need a stairgate with this one!

Mille still loves lights like many young babies do – we have several lights with dangly things on (crystals on the downstairs ones, stars on Callum’s light and butterflies on hers) and she looks up at them and makes a herrrr noise (like when you breathe on a window) to indicate she wants you to blow them to make them move and she’ll smile and giggle when you do.

Like Callum was at this age, it feels like she is on the verge of learning so many new things.

It’s hard to imagine that over the next year she’ll be walking and talking and moving from baby to becoming a proper toddling little girl.

Here’s a little montage of her past year:

		Millie's First Year VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

 

I think I must’ve blinked…could we do that again? Ha! Nah! No chance! Trot onwards please! Eyes forward!