Helping your Older Baby/ Toddler to Sleep

You may have read from my earlier post that I was able to get all three of my children to sleep fairly soundly from an early age.  This does not, however mean that my children’s sleep has always been trouble free…  no, far from it.

JJ and Miss E have not presented me with a problem; they both enjoy their sleep and continue to sleep soundly through the night.  JJ learnt to sleep through very easily, gave up his day time naps at 20 months and I cannot recall ever having a problem with him.  He took a long time to be dry at night (practically 6 years) but children all take a different amount of time to develop the trigger in their brain to wake when they need to pee in the night.  This is one side-effect of sleeping very soundly, perhaps he has inherited his good sleep gene from dh and I, we can both snooze for Britain.

Miss E will be 5 in July and she would love to still have her daytime naps, given half the chance in the car, off she falls to sleep.  At 7 or 7.30pm when her head hits the pillow she snoozes away and her night waking is minimal, just when she is ill or at the moment she seems to wake and cry very quietly that she needs the toilet.

You soon realise that there is no such thing as normal in the realms of parenting. While JJ and Miss E have been problem free Miss M has presented me with enough challenges to keep me going for a lifetime. Some of the challenges we have had to overcome include -

Some days are harder than others

Being a Mum is not easy! I have a feeling I might have posted about this before..................lol

I am still having fun and games with JJ and his bad attitude. He is in his room playing as I type as he lost TV today due to his rudeness this morning and more than anything, due to his not wanting to apologise for his poor behaviour. I spoke to some Mums at the school today and they all seem to say the same thing, that their kids have grown some attitude in the last couple of weeks. In one way I am pleased to hear this, at least it is not just us but in another I also wonder how I will help JJ to lose the bad attitude when all his friends have the same.

Yesterday he came home from school and told me' Loser, whatever minger, your mama works in McDonalds'. Now let me say this was not directed at me as a derogatory remake but more to show off what the new thing he had learnt was. He told me he was taught this at breakfast club by one of the women that runs it. I did complain to the manager, we will see the outcome. I wonder if this is explains some of the behaviour, if he is being exposed to this kind of rubbish twice per week. He knows not to repeat this again!

Then you have the twins, they just wear me out and wear me down sometimes. M is the minx really - into everything and you say no and she laughs and runs off. I have to end up threatening or having a big voice to get her to tow the line. E is much better at doing as she is told but she cries and whinges and I really hate that - it grates on me.

It is all just silly stuff, but it makes things so much more difficult. I have to go out and collect dh in a moment and I turn round and they both have nappies, skirts and tights off. Just something extra to take another 5 mins before we leave the house! I feel like shouting I give up! M is like a puppy dog quite happy to pee wherever so my carpet is taking a beating. E has got pretty good and enjoys using the potty and getting her sticker.

I am off out to ED tonight and boy do I need it as I have been struggling and I am so hungry at the moment but I want to hold out until my dinner. I will really enjoy it then.

Whinge or fight back - which is better???

I can hardly even concentrate on this post so I have no idea why I am trying really!

E is the most whingy toddler alive! I have no idea what is wrong with her, teeth I assume. Boy is she a nightmare right now, driving me crazy. I suppose it could just be that she is not getting her own way and she wants my attention ALL the time!

I hate her whinging, I am really not good with the constant whine, cry sort of thing and the disturbed shouts of Mummy. I am expecting social services to arrive at any time to see if I am beating her, she is so noisy. Much of it is induced by her brother and sister teasing her, especially M nicking things from her. I keep wishing she would fight back and stand her ground and then I wonder if I really would like the fights that might break out from that.

So my dilemma, what to do with her????

Someone give me a good answer please!

PS: Just been made to smile, M appear by my side, said 'I'm back' looked at E whinging at my side and said 'ssssshhhh' and walked away! Good idea......

Twin love

It is the little things that often make me smile, especially when it comes to my kids.

This morning when I got up I gave the girls their drink of milk and left them to drink it and wake up in their cots. They have a book each and the music on, it just gives me enough time to shower etc.

I could hear M singing baa baa black sheep, well as good as a 21 month old can - it was cute! What was so much cuter was upon finishing E gave her a clap and shouted 'more, more'. If she can demand encores at that age, I think she could be a real star one day! lol

In general they are loving each other alot more nowadays. M especially loves E and will take any opportunity to give her a hug or kiss and very often knocks her to the floor and hurts her! Perhaps that is why E is not so fussed.

They have both developed a little habit of stroking the other one when they are crying. They also do it to JJ as well and it has a wonderful effect of knocking JJ out of a self-indulgent cry because he can not get his own way.

Top tip on getting toddlers to eat

So who has a toddler who willfully just does not want to eat? Yep, we have all been there. Well here is my top tip, just pulled out my repitore today. Buy a couple of cheap plastic wipe clean placemats, the type that have a character on. Jacob used to have farm animals and noddy. The girls have pooh, tiger, eeyore and piglet.

Then you get the kids to pretend to feed the characters and once they have fed the characters they just sort of feed themselves too and think it is a fab game. It is a tad messy but when it gets the food in them - I do not mind!

What a great age

The girls are just at such a gorgeous age at the moment. They are between 20 - 21 months. So well into toddlerhood and certainly not babies any more but there are still times when all they need is for Mummy or Daddy to give them a big hug.

It is the little things that amaze me and have A and I staring at each other as if to say Wow, both with big grins on our faces. When E is crying (she has a habit of having stuff stolen off her by M, or stumbling and falling) M will toddler over to her and give her a pat and say 'ahhh', if E is really lucky she might even get offered M's dummy - such love!

E is my little tidy up queen, she has been learning well off Mummy. Whenever they finish with a plate, cup etc she brings it to the kitchen and chucks it through the stair gate at me, lol lucky everything is plastic at this stage.

Being the organised sort I am, I bring down clothes for all the kids the night before, to make our mornings easy. Mostly I remove the hangers and they are just nicely laid out. A couple of mornings ago I had not done this and I found M hanging the clothes up on the large radiator in the dining room. Again another mimic of Mummy; when there are clothes that can not tumble dry I hang them there to dry. Seeing me she shouts 'da dar' and gives herself a big clap.