Synchronization of Us

Look at him , he is so big and such a boy . In less than 2 months we will be celebrating his first birthday.

I have a confession to make , for over 4 years i have been a mother and we have yet to baby proof. Ok maybe not completely true the place is safe for the kids, we have never put locks on cupboards or covers on switches …that sort of thing. We have never really needed to , Becca was not interested and as into everything as Eilidh was neither was she.
But the boy , oh my little troublesome man he loves cupboards and drawers and switches and just about anything he can get his hands on. He opens the kitchen cupboards and shuts them again (normally on his fingers) , he opens drawers he can only reach by standing on his toes and shuts them again (normally on his fingers) . Even rooms are not safe as he must shut and open those doors at every opportunity (strangely not on his fingers). I watched him swing from a chest of drawers this evening in desperation at a non opening drawer .
If he sees a switch or a wire he must play with them , phones/remote controls must be eaten and whacked of the floor. He loves to dump lego ,books and toys everywhere and it takes me at least 10 minutes to change a nappy and longer to get him dressed . He finds pennies everywhere resulting in me panicking trying to fish from his mouth He cruises and crawls everywhere but refuses to walk more than one step if i try to get him to walk to me he throws himself forward giggling - its a game you see. You say yes to him and he shakes his head NO , he loves peek a boo and plays it with any object he can find.
He is not an independent or easy child, everything is a fight and he spends a good part of most days screaming .

BUT

He does these cutest little faces , smiles and scrunches up his whole face and i just melt . When i pick him up he snuggles up against my chest and noone else makes him happy like i do . When he feeds his eyes roll back and he looks like the most contented little guy on this planet.
He is quick and funny , and loves to make me laugh (even if its trying to strangle me while he is in the sling… yes really) . He thinks baths are the best thing ever and likes to eat whatever you put in front of him (except Bananas) , he loves meat and would eat that and nothing else.

Despite it all i wouldn’t change him because he is mine and nothing can replace that.

I WILL finish these posts at some point , we are currently in the middle of yet another bad sleep patch and im pretty useless with keeping up while this tired. Eventually talked to a health visitor about Ru’s sleep issues and she is getting to me keep a sleep diary and try to help , just going to let him get his top teeth through first. I don’t think im being unreasonable, i know he is only 10 months old and im not one of these people who think just because of age/weight etc.. that they don’t need a night feed BUT i don’t feel he needs just so many. I would say on average he gets up every 2 hours for a feed , considering these days a night feed and getting him back down can take an hour …well its leaving very little sleep time for me.

We did have a nice day today though, just hung around the house playing with EA Personal Trainer game , the girls love joining in. My 6 year old niece impressed me doing the very long run (4 minutes peeps) , going at top speed and barely breaking a sweat. When the kids were happy i sneaked in a couple of chapters of my current read .

So onto…

Wednesday 15th July

You know when you first notice your child is burning up and you feel that sense of Oh!! No!! here we go again , imagine being on holiday and increase it by about 100. Eils was feeling off the night before but we put it down to being tired , Wednesday morning you could not deny that her temperature was through the roof. She was tired and quiet (which is a word i never use to describe Eilidh) , and just not herself.
We had all been looking forward to Wednesday since we got there , in the evening we got to go and see Nick Jnr. live with Dora, Diego and Ming Ming to . The girls were excited heck i was excited and we did not want to miss it.
It was another easy day , i went out for a while with Rebecca and Ru . Went to a Barney sing a long and then to a Puppet Show . Ru feel asleep (in the pram which was a first) and Rebecca and i spent some time in the amusements .Changed a pound in to 2p so she could play the 2p slot machine and didn’t she just love it , each time is was whoa more money … she never won anything but who really cares. Craig spent sometime playing with Eilidh and they went to pick up some food.
Lunch , lazy afternoon and dinner followed. Eilidh seemed alright aslong as she had some medication in her system , she was eating and chatting away by mid afternoon

We left to go to Dora nice and early , door opened at 6.30 (start 7.30) but wanted to be in the queue for at least 6 . We arrived and i waited while Craig played with the girls. Once in and seated it became a bit of a nightmare, Ru was sleeping in the sling so i could not do much while the girls got bored and demanding …poor Craig was up and down for the hour.

The shows itself was pretty good, the girls LOVED it . Spent most of it on daddy’s knee

Ru woke up just as it was starting and i had to spend about an hour and a half trying to keep him entertained on my knee…never again .

Afterwards we went to the park again , the girls got to spend a good few hours there and we got seats near a grassy patch so Ru could play.

They did not want to leave the park and now i wish we let them have that last 10 minutes , we promised them they could come back the next day but it was heavy rain our last day there.

The show itself was pretty good,

Otherwise known as 30 days begin NOW.

I have previously talked about my need to loose weight , each pregnancy left me heavier than before and these days im pretty horrified by myself. I want to say its not my fault that it was the pregnancies , its the breastfeeding but it all comes down to me . I made my own choices and let myself get this way.

A month ago i started a diet , i call it a diet but it was more of a cutting down and im finding its working great. Im 8lbs lighter than i was last month (and thats including holiday when i was not trying to cut back) .

For the first time in years i feel like im getting my eating under control , along with eating im also looking to improve on the excersise i do . Im no stranger to moving around , after all i have 3 young children and we walk whenever we go out - thats with the baby in the sling and the girls in either a double pram/single and buggy board. Its not enough , i need to work out and improve other aspects of my fitness.

We already own a couple of the Wii get fit games both of which i have talked about here before. The Wii Family trainer which is great fun and definitely provides a workout . Biggest problem is the minute i get the game out a couple of little girls are fighting for THEIR turn and im pushed to the side.
We also own the Wii fit which i have never been a big fan off , i know plenty of people think its amazing and i think it has the potential to be so . I found i could play for hours though and not break a sweat , i would spend most of my time trying to decide what to play . As with The Family Trainer i cannot play it with the kids around as they want their shot .

This all leads to my latest toy , The EA Sports Active - Personal Trainer . It sounded perfect and most of all fun , i love the idea of the 30 day challenge and set work outs . There is a wide selection of games and exercises which increase in difficulty the more you play. It comes with a leg band (for the numchuck ) and a resistance band (and can be used with the Wii Balance board but its not essential ) .
You can track your progress , set yourself goals and record the foods your eating . Encouraging you to look after yourself in all walks of life.

Is it as good as it sounds ?

So far i have spent a little time playing around with it , each time spending around 30 minutes and once finished felt like i had a proper work out . It seems to be the perfect solution to my need for more excersise (without the cost and hassle of a gym membership) .
Today im starting the 30 day challenge , each day i will undertake a series of excersise designed to improve my body . Every Monday for the next 4 weeks i will report back on how it went , letting you know what i felt i got out of the game along with *gulp* any weight loss or gain.

Does that mean i have to say what my starting weight is …ok 212lbs . Its hard saying that on a public forum but its out now .

Hopefully will have a great review to post next week.

Im really looking forward to getting these posts done with , been letting them drag on way to long. Been a busy few days , non stop Friday and i had my first post baby evening out. Went to a friends Ann Summers party and had a blast, thankfully she lives 2 minutes away so if Ru needed me i could run straight back .
Saturday i got up feeling horrible …and no it was not the drink. Finally caught what ever bug the others had , spent the day in bed sleeping and have decided im going to get sick more often lol. Not slept so much in years it was wonderful.

Tuesday 14th July

We had a nice easy day Tuesday, we had been doing so much and all needed a day of rest.

In the morning we went swimming again, we picked up a ring for Ru which unfortunately really sucked. We had a great one for Rebecca when she was little but this was just to wide for him and he hated it, the girls loved to “surf” the waves and rapids. He was so tired during and the poor little guy actually feel asleep during the swimming , he was mighty unimpressed when i took him out to get dressed.

Afterwards it was lunch and home , Ru and i took a nap and Craig went out for a while with the girls to kick a ball around.

(She wanted to go to sleep)

And that was about that…

The kids all went down early and Craig and i spent the night watching stuff on the Laptop and talking.

Finally getting around to day 4 . Just been having a couple of down days this week, post holiday blues coupled with being stuck inside since the Weekend. Today though everyone seems nice and healthy and we went to a friends for a few hours. Its amazing the difference it makes just getting out for a while. We are glad M’s house it still standing though , there was 8 under 5s there this afternoon and no fights broke out lol.

Monday 13th July

(I love her and her crazy expressions)

This was one of these very busy days , getting up and going going all day long. It was also the day we found “Bob’s” . I was all excited to see the park contained a special fun fair for the under 5s , not so excited when we could not find it. It was not listed on the map and yes i know we could of asked but neither Craig or i are the type of person who finds that thing easy . Monday we came across it and the girls were in heaven. It really is great not having to tell them NO , these rides are so expensive normally and they get a shot each - here they were all free and it was awesome.

(They got to ride some teacups

(Fly A Plane)

(Drive A Train)

(Play on a slide)

And much much more…

It ended when Rebecca fell and hurt her knee, this girl is such a drama queen . She went on and on and on about it , its so different from Eilidh who also fell and skinned her knee an hour later and never even mentioned it (and it looked worse).

After fair time we went to Pizza Hut for a buffet lunch ,getting there just before a party of 50 arrived . Once done Craig went for a walk back to the room to pick up some stuff and the girls and i took in a show and shared a bag of bite size muffins (YUMMY)

The afternoon was spent at the beach , much like the rest of the week it was a windy dull but dry day . The kids wanted to go and we wanted to take them , im glad we went then as the week just got wetter and wetter.
The girls loved playing in the sand, building sandcastles with daddy. Although Craig did keep stealing there buckets and causing tantrums lol .

The tide was so far out , we attempted a walk to the ocean

About half way there Rebecca wanted to go back , she and Craig went back to the sand
while Eils and i kept going.

Eilidh was fascinated by the whole thing , even brave enough to dip a little toe into the freezing cold water.

And what about the boy…He spent the afternoon sound asleep

After a busy day we planned a light evening, we went home for dinners and baths (sand everywhere…shudder) we went out to an Pantomime of “Goldlocks and the 3 bears” . I loved it , nothing like live shows (even kiddie ones) and these are done so well . Very Professional .

And what about the boy…He spent the evening sound asleep

Just don’t have it in me today, been one of these really blah days . The boy is ill with who knows what - DH say it was definitely not swine flu he had and it appears Ru has a tooth about to burst through . Either way he has been clingy, fussy and sleepy today.
Wish he was sleepy last night though , think i managed around 2 broken hours.

Been a long day , i managed an hour nap this morning before dh went back to work. The girls played well even though my living room was destroyed . I burnt dinner and ended up making French toast for us all .

Its also now been a year since Rebeccas hospital stay . It mostly feels like a dream now , did that really happen? How did we all get through it?

For now all 3 children are sleeping and im going for a bath to try and chase away the blues

Less on the words and more on the pictures today . Im tired tonight , the boy was up alot last night and even when he was down i had trouble sleeping. Watched the first episode of True Blood before i went to bed and it gave me a horrible nightmare , i woke shaking and terrified . I cannot remember any details other than how scared i was in it…
Craig is also ill , i think its Swine Flu but he says Nope (he has all the symptoms….) . Really i think he is scared as he totally bought into all the panic surrounding it. Both girls had an off day on holiday , nothing big and thankfully Rebecca’s was on the way home but just high temperatures and feeling tired. Ru is not himself today , he has been sick a few times and not touching food (still taken plenty of milk though ) . Craig thinks im to happy by the idea of it , that i want us to have it - and yes i admit it i do. For 1 - it would be over with and we could stop worrying about the news reports and 2 - No need for the vaccine which we have been arguing over all week (even though its not out. He says big YES while i was NO WAY) . We just spent a week in a very busy holiday park and travelled up and down the country , we came into contact with alot of people…

I seem to have been sidetracked lol

Sunday 12th July

It was a slow day , it was great as the whole week we just took it at an easy pace. Sure some days were busier than others but for the most part we just went with how the kids were. Relaxing and having fun was the goal.

Sunday we spent the morning swimming , our poor children are very deprived in that area. Rebecca went plenty during her first year with Craig but once Eilidh came along he mostly stopped , not because of Eilidh but just time (remember he was working almost full time hours while doing a full time degree) . I could not take them as need one adult per child under 5. Of course now we cannot even take the kids ourselves so Ru had never been before, Eilidh has only been once before (plus our local swimming pool is closed just now so have to travel for it) .
All 3 loved the pool , neither girl had any fears and spent the whole time jumping , swimming playing on the various slides. They were so happy , and loved getting full faces of water. Ru was just as happy , splashing around and bouncing when he could.

After Swimming was lunch , some indoor play and back home for naps . We had a light dinner and headed back out around 5pm.

(How we travelled most of the holiday , one girl in pram and other on buggy board while Ru was in the sling . It was only a 5 minute walk from room to park but this just made it quicker. Mostly once there they got out of the pram but it was great for keeping jackets etc.. in)

Craig , Ru and i relaxed at a bar for a while having a couple of drinks while the girls played in shows.

(Total fascination with this cone , i can picture him 18 years from now drunk as can be doing the same thing lol)

(Pretty girl waiting her turn)

(Rebecca showing her how its done)

One of the stages was hosting a kids gameshow at 7.30 which sounded fun so when the doors opened there at 6.30 we went down hoping to get a decent seat. It worked perfectly and Ru fell asleep and even went in the pram , the girls danced happily to the music and i got to sit back and relax. They had such fun and were so cute running around burning off all that energy they have . Once the game show started they lost interest, while it had said suitable to tots and toddlers they found it boring so we left to go home . Not before they stopped and played with Bob for a while

(This so makes me giggle. We were trying to get a nice picture of them both and they kept putting there hands up around there heads. So Craig put his hands on his belly and told them to do the same , true he has a bit of a belly but its not that bad)

Lastly we stopped at another bar which has an outside playgroup , the girls loved it and it became part of our night time routine to play there for a while.

After all that it was home time again , all 3 went down and Craig and i watched an episode of Malcolm in the Middle before going to bed ourselves.

Saturday 11th July

We woke all excited for our first day on the Saturday morning. Before fun could begin we had to unpack and get ready .

(I LOVE this picture, the look on Ru’s face gets me everytime)

At first we all planned to go and pick up some shopping before realising just how silly that was and Craig and Ru went themselves while the girls and i went exploring.

We took a walk to the main hall - the Skyline Pavilion - this is really the centre of the park with all the shows/pubs /places to eat etc… and has everything else surrounding it. We caught the last 10 minutes of a Barney live show (If your happy and you know it….it made me cry the girls were so excited ) . After that we found the fair ground , or should i say adult fairground (although you were only talking about a dozen rides , no roller coasters or anything like that) .

The girls got to have a bounce on the trampolines.

We rode a swinging boat together

And well that was about it , everything else they were to small for. Except the big carrosole (sp?) but a child needed an adult to sit with them so we could not go on it then. I promised we would come back but it was not to be , each time we went to the adult fair again it was raining and nothing opened . Much like the Jumping Pillow , it cost to use but we promised the girls if they were good on our last day they could get a shot . The last few days the weather was horrible and it was closed .

After the fair they spent some time in the Indoor Play area.

And i spent some time playing with my phone lol…

After shopping we met up with the boys and all had a much deserved lunch break followed by some more playing around with the game machines.
We went back to the room around 2 . Ru, Eils and i were all tired so took afternoon naps while Craig and Becca went out for a walk along the beach (it was just across the street) .

We eat a light dinner and all got bathed/showers and ready to go out for the night.

Our first stop was the Skyline stage to watch The Syline Gang in action.

We sang, we danced , we ran away …

Another quick ride in the teacups followed

(She looks so grown up here, makes me sad)

We attempted to go to another entertainment stage “Reds” but by then i think the kids had all had enough , plus it was so busy and had no seats near the dancefloor to keep an eye on the children. We headed home and all 3 went straight to sleep.

One thing i found really strange was going to the “clubs” , they seemed just like any other night clubs with its music , lightning and crowds but with as many children as adults . Children are welcome anytime its open .

Friday 10th July.

When my alarm goes of at 3am i don’t even hear it , the first i know is when Craig wakes ME up. This may not sound much to anyone else but almost every week day Craig’s alarm goes off and does not wake him , i may be sleeping in another room but it will wake me (and normally the kids to) but he sleeps on. Of course i had been up till midnight with Ru , and again at 2am ….so i was tired.

We planned to be on the road for 4am , 5.30am we finally set off. Car packed to bursting and all of us excited , neighbours must of loved the kids running around outside at that time of the morning.

The journey went surprisingly well , we bought in car DVD players for the girls and made DVDs of their favourite shows . They loved these and it helped keep them happy . Ru was a little star , only twice did he start to fuss - once when needing fed and then about 20 minutes or so before we arrived (i think he had had enough).

We got to the park at 5.30pm , so exactly 12 hours which was not bad (journey can be done it 8.5 but we did have to stop for food, toilet breaks, feed Ru and Craig needed to pull over a few times when he got tired) . Took a while to find where we were going but finally got settled into our apartments.
They were basic and small but done the job , of course one of the first things Craig done was get himself locked in the toilet he he he …

We were all starving, lunch had been around 11am and nothing since (well except for Ru of course) . Had to wait for Craig to get the bags from the car first and we finally got to go and eat. Took the easy option at Pizza Hut , even Rebecca managed a full (kids) pizza herself - our poor starving kids lol..

We took a wonder around , by this point most of the kiddie entertainment had stopped and adult stuff started (which kids are allowed to go to) . The girls played in the rides (not the free ones unfortunately) for a while before we headed home.
Its was 11pm when we got back (and remember my kids are normally sleeping for 6-7pm ) and Rebecca who like alot of 4 year olds normally fights bedtime was in her pjs first . She proceeded to put herself straight to bed and sleep …again this may not sound like a big deal but in all her years she has never went to sleep alone in her own bed. She still gets held to go to sleep. She slept alone till 2am before coming in with us
Eilidh was a little more awkward , claiming she did not like her bed (she is very attached to her bed at home) but with a few hugs went down fine.

Ru….well he was Ru and im not going to go on about his night time sleeping to much as i would rather not repeat myself every night. For the most part it was horrid , up every hour or so and taken ages to go back down . I know it was a strange place and strange bed , there was also no light or anything in the room . Night feeds were no fun with basic tv (5 channels arggggggg) and no remote control . I played with my phone alot.

So there we go day one was over , turn in tomorrow for day 2

After a long 14 hour journey we made it home around 12.30 last night .

Its been a wonderful week , we all enjoyed the break and time together and the kids could not of been happier. Rebecca was not happy coming home AT ALL.

We are already thinking of were to go next year lol…and it will be overseas the only bad part about the holiday was the weather . Rain , Rain and a little more rain.

Expect lots of pictures and posts from me over the next few days as i attempt to write about it all