Let's head down to Georgia, la la la

Yes our baby has turned! At least, he/she had at the last check up 2 weeks ago, I have another one tomorrow and was going to leave updating until then to make sure but I can't sleep this morning and have a rare, toddler-free hour or so. Let's all hope there have been no flipping shenanigans between then and now. I don't think so, due to where the movements are, but still a bit paranoid.

Nearly 36 weeks now so really at the tail end. In fact, tomorrow will mark the exact stage in this pregnancy that my waters broke in my last one. On Valentines Day. Ahh Abi, spoiling Mummy and Daddy's time alone right from the beginning...

I wonder how I'll go if I go right to 40+ weeks with this one. I've always felt I avoided those super-uncomfortable, last stages of pregnancy last time. I never really felt that huge, never couldn't shave my legs or cut my toenails, never got any stretchmarks, never needed help getting off the couch etc etc. This pregnancy though has definitely been more uncomfortable with the pelvic instability and I feel more pressure and discomfort when walking. I've pretty much given up my big walks, although if I didn't have to push a pram with a 2.9 year old I could probably still manage them.

Speaking of pelvic instability I went for craniosacral therapy and it was miraculous. It really made a huge difference to how uncomfortable I was feeling as well as making me feel really positive generally and as though I was getting everything into tip top shape for a nice, easy birth. I'm hoping that, along with the Calmbirth course and practice I've done/am doing that I will be able to birth this baby with no intervention. The main thing is that I avoid another induction.

I'm on maternity leave now which is glorious, glorious and have a looong to-do list that I am slowly ticking off. I am having trouble about Christmas though, as I love Christmas; doing all the planning and thinking about how the day will go. Thing is, I don't know whether I'll still be pregnant, have a teeny newborn, or, best fun of all, be actually in labour. Right now the plan is that everyone will come up to our place for lunch on Christmas Eve, but I don't have to actually do anything. I might make something if I'm still pregnant though. I saw this yummy desert called Eton Mess which looks easy, summery and delicious so I think that'll be the go.

We are mostly organised here presents-wise. Abi's presents are all bought and I might start wrapping them tonight. Still need to get some family ones, but several are done, including my hard-to-buy-for, world-travelling brother. DH and I don't do big Christmas presents as our anniversary is very soon after and we do special themed anniversary ones instead.

I think I'm still in a bit of denial that soon I will be the mother of TWO children. Abi is very excited in theory and full of love for "our new baby", with lots of pats, kisses and professions of eternal love. She has many plans about what she will do with the baby including sharing baths, sharing her favourite ice cream (which she has had ONCE, boy did it make an impression), carrying him/her in the hugabub and other charming unrealities. However, she objects strongly whenever she sees me with my hands on my belly and moves them away firmly saying, "Mummy no touch our new baby." Not sure that's such a good sign.

She is still going through a very sensitive and emotional stage, although it is less intense than it was a couple of weeks ago. She even had her very first toddler melt-down a week or so ago, DH was flabbergasted and I was surprised myself. It was over nothing really, she wanted a drink of water but also wanted to push it away - I ended up just sitting on the floor with her and cuddling for about half-an-hour. Hasn't happened again thankfully.

BUT, and I can't believe I haven't mentioned this before now, she has finally, FINALLY, started reliably sleeping through the night. I think I had just stopped hoping for this to ever happen as it actually took a few nights in a row before I really took it in. She had a little while where she'd wake up and need me to lay her back down again, but now she mostly just sleeps straight through with the odd restless moment. I, on the other hand, still wake up two or three times a night for no reason, sigh.

I know she'll probably go through periods of wakefulness again, but at least I now know she can do it. And all our co-sleeping, gentle parenting nonsense hasn't created a child who can't put herself back to sleep, so take that Tizzie Hall. She still needs me to help her fall asleep initially, but we don't feed to sleep, just cuddle and I tell her one story and sing her one song. The stories change at her request but are mostly at the moment revolving around going to buy ice cream together. It's funny, she never requests actual ice-cream when we are out. She probably hasn't worked out you can just go and get it whenever you want, that there's not just one magical place which only comes to the top of the tree every six months or so.

We were going to go to the pool today as forecast is 36 degrees, yuk yuk yuk, but it is looking very windy and unpleasant. We'll see how we go.

I promised a belly shot and am determined to take one today. In the meantime...

Things that wail "mi" in the night

So we have bitten the night weaning bullet around here over the last couple of weeks. A quick background: Abi has slept through the night once since she was born and usually wakes up every couple of hours or so. She has/will occasionally do a four, five or even six hour stretch when she first goes to sleep, but after that first wake up (anywhere between 11pm and 3am) she will be awake every two hours.

After the tearing out of hair and trying multitudes of different strategies over her first 18 months I just admitted defeat and tried not to think about it too much. Nothing we did or didn't do made any difference and I have always been adamant that I will never leave her to cry or put her in a cot. So the traditional methods don't work for our family and I knew there was no point going to a sleep school. We co-sleep as part of our parenting philosophy and it is not something I am willing to compromise.

That's not to say I haven't often fallen into despair during the early hours of the morning, especially during those times, now mercifully behind us, when she would wake up and stay awake for anything up to an hour and a half. The only thing that comforted me during those times was the thought that "Thank God I don't have a newborn as well"...hang on, guess I won't be able to use that one for much longer.

So to night weaning. It's time, she's nearly two and a half, I'm still available for cuddles, songs etc, I know she's not insecure, we're just turning off the boob tap between midnight and six. I got this idea from a gentle parenting site written by an American paediatrician who points out that it is those six hours which are the most important for adults.

It hasn't gone too badly really. We started two weeks ago and have certainly had some bad times where she would wail "Mi, mummy more mi" over and over again, interspersed with screams of rage and flingings of bodies on beds. For a while I sported a nice shiner on my left eye from a back-of-head-meets-cheekbone contact during one of these sessions. At some point though each night she would subside into pathetic sobs and say "Abi tu'ool [cuddle] mummy" and I would know we were through the worst of it.

This is still going on to some extent and we have had a bout of gastro in the middle that hasn't helped, but generally I am standing firm and getting more solid blocks of sleep than I have had since she was born. I am cautiously confident that we will at least be down to one wake up per night by the time baby number two arrives, and hopeful we might be down to none, or at least no feeds.

I wanted to post a belly shot, but our camera has mysteriously disappeared. I will do so as soon as it turns up.