the case of the disappearing/ reappearing nappies

some weeks ago i counted up percy's cloth nappies. we bought 20 when she was born. due to some slackness on our part one became too badly stained after sitting with unwashed poo on it for a few days, to be used again. that one got thrown out, leaving us obviously with 19. however my count revealed we only had 12. hmmmm...? where had these $20 a piece nappies disappeared to? we were also down two $35 each cloth covers.
i concluded after much deliberation that they'd vanished while at day care. which is a real connundrum as i don't want to march in there accusing them of either losing or throwing out over $200 worth of nappies. i can only think they went missing while at day care because at home and at day care are the only places we use them. if, for example, we are going to paul's parents or out for most of the day we generally use disposable nappies for the convenience. hence, unless someone pinched them off the clothes line (!) day care is the only place left.

i'm further confirmed in this opinion because yesterday in percy's bag when she came home from day care was one cloth nappy and one cover. for the past two weeks we been sending disposable nappies to day care so these two must have been there for at least this amount of time. (we've decided we can't afford to risk losing more cloth nappies- meaning the weekly shopping bill has just gone up by $22 for disposables.)
i'm very pleased to have a cover back. the $35 not withstanding it's easier to keep the system going with three or more (we were rotating 4) covers.

perhaps if i'm patient more disappeared nappies will reappear!


p.s. we've had some good nites of sleep with percy lately. we've even convinced her when she wakes at 4:45am or 5:30am or somewhere around there to go back to sleep for another hour or so. this morning paul pulled her blankets up and she went back to sleep 'til 7am! wowee!

new ball game

literally. on the weekend we took percy to harry noble playground on her tricycle. she still very much likes riding and is very good about putting on her helmet. she says "helmet" repeatedly while preparing to go out and says and does "chin up" so we can buckle it on.
anyways, her little soccer ball pretty much lives in the parcel bucket on the trike; percy and her pappa discovered a new ball game...

the redeeming

i'm pleased to report that percy slept very well last nite. i pulled her blanket up with a five minute "shoosh" at 12:30am and no more peeps until 5:30am. when i told her it wasn't time to get up yet. she nodded off for another 45 minutes. ah, rest...

the ugly

well, yesterday i didn't have an "ugly" to go with the good and the bad. now i do.
oh dear, we'll never understand what a good nights sleep is ever again. being this tired makes me despair. why all the moaning...

percy allowed us about four hours sleep last nite.

because of the inconsiderate neighbours the nite before we thought we would go to bed nice and early and get some much needed z's. we were all tucked up by 9pm.
i first pulled her blanket up and 'shooshed' her at 11:30pm, then again at 12:30am, when she was awake again only ten minutes later i knew we were in for a bad one. we tried all the usual tricks but didn't close our eyes again until 3:45am. then little miss had the hide to wake up at 5:45am.

oh christ! breakfast at the wahltuch/ blumkaitis house this morning was not cheerful. i'm ready to resort to witch doctors to get some sleep tonite!

the bad

while percy slept quite well last nite we hardly slept at all. our arsehole neighbours got married today. which was excuse enough for them to play loud music, scream and smoke cigarettes under our window until 1am last nite. despite us asking them twice to shut up and the cops asking them once, they were undeterred. i really don't give a flying f**! if they were getting married, my life and everyone elses' goes on. including for us a baby that never, ever, ever sleeps past 6am. which suits us fine if we've been asleep ourselves from around 10pm the nite before.

we've resolved we can't stand it any more. we've had a litany of neighbours from hell for five years. we need a free standing house in a quiet locale. which sad to say we don't believe exists in erskineville. or at least not in our price range. we're selling up and moving on. i'll really miss it as, despite the opinion of a great many people (including our respective parents) erskineville is not a rubbishy hole. it's really sweet and friendly. it's welcoming and different. it's convenient and contemporary. i really like that the guys in the video shop, the fruit and veg shop, the chinese take away, the pizza take away, the deli and the newsagency know our names. that the doctors and the chemist know percy so well. that everything we want in our lives is a short walk or bike ride (or if absolutely necessary a short drive) away. i like the narrow streets and the trees and the mix of houses. i particularly like the weirdos and freaks. they're our kind of weirdos and freaks. i like that adam spencer rode past us on his bicycle when percy was just a few weeks old and congratulated us. i like all the cafe people being so friendly and chatty. i like the well mannered dogs that percy loves to pat (and the well mannered owners who clean up after their dogs.) i like the little pocket parks and the expanses of sydney park.

oh well..... (sigh)

who's to say we won't find these things elsewhere? or something even better? at present- me!

the good

percy slept well last nite. she needed a little shush at 10pm and then her blankets pulled back up with an even littler shush at 3:30am, then she woke at 5:45am for a cuddle in our bed for half an hour.

we had planned to meet some friends this morning at tamarama to enjoy 'scuplture by the sea' together. unfortunately poor baby rose was very ill. so she wasn't up to it plus her parents needed to stay home and catch up on sleep. and paul's cousins simply could not get a parking spot. they drove around for half an hour looking unsuccessfully. i think the only reason we got a spot is because we have a small hatch back car and are used to "kirribilli parking." we call it kirribilli parking because this is the first place that we lived together where parking is extremely rare and tight. if you can park in kirribilli- with 48 tiny reverses and pulling forward to get into a spot; we say you can park anywhere!

so we walked around the headland just the three of us. percy was very well behaved and interested in a number of the sculptures. she particularly liked a wire 'igloo' type installation that she crawled inside of. however once inside she decided it was poo time. not really a big deal, except that i've noticed percy kinda stalls after a poo until her nappy is changed. meaning i had to crawl in after her and carry her out ape/commando style. it was fun actually- and i wasn't the only grown-up to be crawling thru!

we had a little swim at tamarama after too. percy's only been in pools or little wave seas (black sea and wakiki) so far in her life. she wasn't too sure about the slightly bigger waves at tamarama. it was pretty cold too; i didn't push the issue of staying in! she loved covering me in sand once back on our towel anyways.

piccies...

separation anxiety

poor monkey seems to be going thru an age-appropriate developmental thingo at present. all three days this week when i have dropped her at day care she has cried and wailed not to be left without me. she hasn't done this in months and months. it's really awful.

we arrive happily enough; go thru the ritual of putting the stroller away, putting raffles on her bed, putting her bag in her locker and then sitting down for some second breakfast.
on monday as i was walking out the door after saying good bye and getting kisses from her, she started to cry. the staff stepped in and comforted her quickly. when i rang a half hour later they said she had calmed down quickly and eaten her breakfast.
yesterday was the same except the tears started as i was saying goodbye next to her little chair at the breakfast table.
today she didn't even sit long enough to get any food in front of her. as soon as she sat down she slid off and wrapped herself around my legs, crying plaintively.
of course when i insist on leaving the crying becomes screaming and twisting her body about to be let down so she can chase after me. luckily her teachers are adept at helping her cope at these times and distract her with stories or activities with the other children.

still i feel awful. i want to insist to paul that one of us doesn't work at least every one of the week days so that she can stay with us. that's a pipe dream...

separation anxiety, i have read, often kicks in around this age because toddlers are getting more capable of exploring their world on their own, braver and bigger, but still require a secure base they can come back to, and lots of reassurance that it's all okay.
this could also explain why this week and a little last week, while her bedtime routine is the same and she happily goes to bed, as soon as we get up and walk out the door she starts to cry for us. some nights she'll drop off to sleep on her own anyways, other nites, like last nite, i rubbed her back and "shooshed" her for about ten minutes.

i feel so sorry for her that she doesn't feel brave and strong all the time. it's overwhelming to be little and not in control. poor chooken, as i've started calling her.

p.s

percy slept thru last nite (moday 20 oct)! she took a little while to go to sleep initially- paul and i took turns rubbing her back and 'shooshing' 'til she fell asleep (about 40 minutes in total- but that included turning all the lights on and chasing out a big blow fly that was just irritating the shit out of all of us.)
she woke up and came into our bed for a 1/2 hour cuddle at 6am.
keep up the good effort bubby!

horsies!

as part of the on-going 'art and about' horse thingo (you might recall we had a lump of clay to fashion into a small horse some weeks ago) there was a procession of horses thru the streets of erskineville on saturday afternoon. rose and her daddy chris came over to watch them go past our front door with us. the girls both seemed to enjoy the novel afternoon with much pointing, hair pulling (poor chris) and squeals.

cold toes

percy insists on taking off her shoes and socks regularly. she sometimes then also insists that we do too. when i complained to her the other day of having cold toes; this was her solution...

i'm not convinced of the efficiency.

previously she has insisted on us taking our clothes off too (i think her pappa put her up to it- to get me naked!)

music class resumed

after a two week school holiday break, music classes resumed on wednesday. percy is now in an older age group- 18 months to 3 years. part of our take home materials inlcuded two harmonicas. which she just found enthralling. we went up king street in the afternoon, percy on her trike, puffing thru the harmonica the whole way! because she was holding on to the handle bars with her hands and the harmonica with her mouth she could only make the one same note, over and over. oh well, she loved it.

sydney children's festival

on the 8th of oct for our usual wednesday parents group get together we went to carriageworks in eveleigh where some of the children's festival was being held. i forgot to charge the camera batteries so didn't get that many pictures but some...

there was lots of great things to do- climbing, drawing, a swamp forest to explore, bottles filled with coloured water to tap out tunes on, shadows to make and what seemed to be percy's favourite- cards! she may have been making up the rules to hold-'em poker tho, i'm not sure.

nice to nazgool in point 9 of a second

for those that need a little reminder prompt the nazgool are the nine undead kings enslaved by sauron in the lord of the rings trilogy. (i spelt it phonetically, don't know if it is correct.)

we think this is an apt description of percy on monday nite. she wailed and screamed from 1:30am just like the nazgool are depicted as doing in the LOTR movies. for a bloody hour and a half!! how can a kid sustain that sort of energy and focus?!
she is very wilful (see her gene pool for reasons why!) and had in her head that she would sleep in the big bed with mamma and pappa monday nite. she had been sleeping with us, or at least me as paul again decamped to the lounge, during her stomach bug illness and again when her fever was running its course. she obviously got a taste for it.
by 3am both paul and i were sitting on her bedroom floor, shaking our heads and despairing of ever sleeping again, while little miss, most tragically, clutching her teddy bear in one hand, head down, crawled slowly down the corridor towards our bedroom. if it hadn't been so frustrating and enraging it would have been sad.

what happened in the end? we gave up and gave in.

yesterday we were determined to get back on routine. we thought we'd have more success because her and i would be home together. it's working a bit. she had her nap in her cot with less than ten minutes of protesting. went to sleep in her cot last nite with no protest, put herself back to sleep without intervention from us when she woke mid nite. at 4:30am she woke and came into our bed. oh well, better than 10:30pm
she started her nap today in her cot without a bother. so progress in the right direction...

it's lucky she's so adorably adorable the rest of the time! because when nice little bubba goes nazgool on us it's really hard.

yet again

percy cam home early from day care on friday as she had a high temperature. needless to say we've had a pretty rotten weekend. tho she seems quite good this evening. hopefully she'll sleep well tonite and we can get back to normal tomorrow.

tricycle!

on monday afternoon we bought percy a tricycle! she seems to love it already.
piccies of assembly, riding about yesterday and then today when she fell asleep at the wheel! (handlebars.)

words, words, words

people tell me that percy has advanced language skills for her age. without having a head too big to fit thru average door-ways, i'm somewhat inclined to agree.

she repeats everything we say immediately. she only has to hear it once to recognisably repeat it. not just paul and i recognising it either, other people too. (this was manifestly brought home to us this morning when i said "fuck" at pi our cat and she promptly repeated "pi fuck, pi fuck". oh dear.)

she knows the meanings of most of what she says too. (thankfully not the word in the previous brackets.) good ones this week are "come", while holding out her hand to led you somewhere, "hot" when she sees steam, "milk" and "bottle", "open" and "close", "empty" and "more" what paul swears was "pretty mamma" this afternoon, and potentially the ability to count!? surely not. this is what makes us think this... percy asked for a water bottle "lid" that was on the draining board, paul handed it to her, she then asked for another one, once she had both in her hands she clearly said "two lids", i kid you not! yes, yes, we'll be signing her up for mensa soon.

the other upside of this language explosion (aside from feeling like we spawned a genius) is that we are all able to communicate with each other far better than previously. unless of course she's latched onto a word that is right for her but makes no sense to us- then she gets really frustrated at how thick her parents are.

her favourite song at present is baa baa black sheep. this is as much as she can sing...
"baa baa back sheep
....
yes sir, yes sir
.... full
one ....
and one ....
and one for the ...."

at the end we substitute "...for the little girl who lives on smiths lane" she claps enthusiastically for more.

October 2008

what a big month it has been already, and it's not yet a full seven days old.
percy has recovered from her stomach bug. seemingly quite quickly as on saturday at our parents get together tara told me that joe was vomiting for eight days when he had a run-in with a stomach bug a while ago. poor little fellow! he also lost a kilo in weight over the time it took him to beat it.
she was still under the weather and quick to tire on saturday. she had two naps instead of her usual one.

on sunday we all drove to paul's parents in wollongong in the morning but only two of us drove home an hour or so later. drum roll.... after carrying in all the necessary paraphenalia to keep a toddler healthy and happy for a day and night, staying to play for a short while and be sure she was comfortable with where she was, paul and i left percy with her grandparents for the night! was it harder for her or me? me, i think.
percy had a parting sook and cry but was happy reading a book five minutes later. she also had her great aunt thelma and great uncle steve to entertain her. they are back from their months and months explore of australia in skippy the campervan. (if anyone is wanting to buy a campervan they've got a good one to off load.) we have been advised to go easy on the "great" label but it's such fun to tease!

so, paul and i came home by ourselves. i think i did remarkably well for my first over night separation from my baby. no tears, no wailing, no wringing of the hands, no waking up in cold sweats! i understand percy did equally well. she loves her grandparents dogs so was well distracted and entertained by them. particularly when she woke at 3am and needed some help going back to sleep. apparently one jumped up on the bed she was sharing with her gran and laid his head over her legs- how sweet!
when we returned on monday morning to collect her she was happily, and very concentratingly (word?) mixing up some pancakes in the kitchen. we were in the door and watching her for five minutes or more before she noticed us.

what does one do on a baby free afternoon and night? well, first you take a nap.


huh? what? there's something after that? oh yeah, right... what next...

second, you see a movie without worrying about turning the volume down because you're in a cinema and the baby ain't going to get woken up. third, you come home and doll up for a night out with your perfect husband. fourth, you have a great cocktail called a bonsai kitten at madam fling flongs. (you could have more but one was enough to make me stagger so that'll do.) fifth, you sample as much of the tapas at madam ff's that you can stuff in. sixth, you walk home holding hands under a starry sky (disregard the fact that it was cloudy and the city lights pretty much drown out the stars.) seventh, your devoted husband gives you the best body massage you've ever had. eigth, you... that'll do! this is a blog about percy afterall. she's well under-age!

that's the biggest news. we not only survived but enjoyed a night apart from each other.

absolutely awful

percy is still awfully sick. i had a dose last nite too. thankfully i've mostly thrown it off today, feeling low but not outright miserable like she is. the whole family has stayed home to look after each other and be quiet together.
no vomiting from percy for more than 24 hours now so perhaps she's on the mend in that regard. she has eaten tiny amounts and drunk a reasonable amount of water. just hanging in there now...

bike helmet

oh oh oh!! gotta tell you this before i forget! on tuesday, when percy was still feeling well we had a super day. i rode us down to have lunch with pappa, on the push bike. percy of course had to wear her bike helmet. after her nap i needed to go up king street for a few things. percy went in her stroller- wearing her bike helmet the whole time!! she demanded to put it on and wouldn't take it off! can't get her to wear a hat for longer than 5 minutes but a bike helmet for over an hour- go figure.
needless to say we got a few weird looks from passers-by, particularly other parents or parents-to-be. i could just see in their heads "gee, do we need to get a helmet for the baby?" or "she's an over-protective mum!" it was very funny, i think i giggled quietly the whole trip.
she even refused to take it off at home. preparing dinner- sitting on the bench eating some cheese.

general update

prioir to being laid low with gastroenteritis percy has made some changes on the developmental milestone chart. or she's just growing up and we're responding to that...

1. she now brushes her teeth standing at the sink on a little step, previously she did it in the bath tub. (of course "brushes" is a bit of a generous description- she sucks the toothpaste off the brush, luckily it's a no-flouride hippy organic paste, and chucks a hissy fit if we try to "assist")
2. she dropped using a sleeping bag at night some weeks ago. can't remember when now. which is good because it's too hot for them now anyways.
3. is expanding her vocabulary and understanding- and making us understand her! she sometimes uses three word sentences tho mostly it's one word and signs.
4. is sleeping much better. when she's not sick of course. so we've had about a total of 4 weeks in the past 18 months of sleeping thru the nite without either of us making any visits to her bedroom or cot-side. hopefully as she gets healthier the good sleeping will become the norm!
5. is quite affectionate, asking for cuddles a lot. yippeee! i love this part.
(6. ain't eating much; even when well. oh well, persist, persist, persist. bllrrghhhh.)
7. back to the good stuff... she can climb lots of the equipment at day care and playgrounds. both her fine and gross motor skills seem to be pretty good.

anyways, while she's on her third nap of the day i ought to do some useful things too. nearly all the four sets of sheets she spewed all over are washed and put away again... nearly done.

stomach bug

percy's caught some nasty gastro bug at present. on tuesday nite after vomiting 4 times between 10pm and midnite we called our gp's after hours emergency service number. we've not used this before so didn't know what to expect. paul spoke to an 'operator', describing our situation and they advised that a doctor would be with us in about an hour, hour and a half. sure enough a doctor was at our front door at 1:30am. unfortunately but good, if you follow my meaning, percy had dozed off in the mean time. when the doctor entered the room she woke up, looked straight at him and said "hello." what a good little hostess!
the doctor pronounced that she does have a stomach bug but no temperature and nothing else wrong. there is no medication safe for a child under 12 years for vomiting and the like- you've just got to tough it out. lots of fluids. he advised if she's still sick in the morning to take her to our usual gp. this was the case. she was ok in the morning but after waking up from a sleep at 1pm she threw up the little she'd eaten in the morning.
thankfully no more vomiting for the remainder of the day and last nite. only once so far today. she managed to eat a little, tiny bowl of mash potatoe and half a slice of vegemite bread this afternoon. being all she has eaten in nearly three days. i've been coaxing water into her as much as possible.

she's listless, grumpy, doesn't want to be touched but does want cuddles and to be carried around (can't win) will read her books a fair bit but generally wants to do things for herself- which she can't at present. poor thing.

home from day care today with me, tomorrow it will be paul's turn.

her first nap of the day on mamma and pappa's bed. the t-shirt says "i'm definately up to something," quite funny but not the case today.