Tiny Turtle Hatchlings

[Leap]

Squishy twin sleeping! I really agree with Bea on letting it settle, I actually started writing it out so I could see the week’s progress and even though I have all the info in my app it really helped to do it like that. The first week felt all over the place, but when I used it to assess good, okay and bad days it turned out we’d had far more successes than failures. And then the second week it was so clear how much better it was by looking, whereas in my head I was mainly focusing on the things that went wrong.

I’m officially going back on 6th July, but expected to be WFH until the end of the year potentially. Flexibility on my hours if I find it easier to get them done across the week instead of set days, and opportunity to come into the office on occasion if I’m comfortable with it. It really sounds like they’ve got our best interests in mind.

[Leap]

This was my first week of writing things out:

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Which I know looks a lot like this:

206E34C5-AB05-41AA-AD8E-3ABA25D1DF5E.jpeg

but even though it’s a shambles, I could see the progress and marked 4 days good, 2 okay and 1 bad, when the week before definitely would’ve been mostly bad. It was also quite soothing to do, but that may just be me!

[Kenickie]

keeping track properly to try and see the better days is a good idea. I think I felt yesterday that I just didn't get an afternoon at all as it all resolved around getting them to sleep, but hopefully it won't be like that every day. It's definitely easy to focus on the bad bits though. The night hasn't been too bad so far although Topsy is now refusing to go back to sleep after being fed.

I'm glad your work are being so flexible, Leap, that's great. WFH until the end of the year is brilliant. Will you still be able to use family for childcare?

I decided I definitely needed a video monitor, partly because of them sharing and needing to check that one wasn't hurting the other, and also because the cot is side car to bed so I didn't want to leave them without being able to see what they were up to in case they rolled into the bed bit and then fell out.

[Kenickie]

That sounds very frustrating, hopefully she'll get it out of her system now though and be back to normal once the baby is here.

Lots of crying when put down for their first nap here, and the bloody monitor camera kept falling down, so I was close to tears too. but now they're asleep, upstairs, and I'm downstairs. The sense of freedom is amazing. It's like having a whole different life.

I kind of feel like an idiot for not doing this months ago, but it's only been a couple of weeks since they wouldn't nap at all during the day unless they were on a person or in the buggy, so I don't think they'd have done it before. The crying was more whingy crying whereas before when I've tried to put them in a cot for naps (which I've tried on and off since they were newborns) it's been full on hysteria. I'm just going to tell myself that anyway. ;)

[Kenickie]

Happy birthday, Hop! And happy being a parent day, Leap. I hope you all are having a lovely weekend!

[Leap]

Thank you! We’re having a lovely day so far

[ParisGal]

[Rhodonite]

Happiest of birthdays, lovely Hop!

[Princess Morripov]

Ah that’s such a lovely picture! Happy birthday Hop!

[Ella77]

Happy birthday to Hop!

[Pippedydeadeye]

Happy birthday to the delightful Hop. She really is amazing.

[Marth]

Happy being one! She is delightful!

[Kenickie]

That's such a lovely photo. It looked like you all had a brilliant time. Well done on for doing such a good job for a whole year!

[happyhighlandcoo]

She looks delighted to be 1 year old. Happy birthday to her!

[Rhodonite]

How is everyone getting on? We've had a lot of teething and sleepless nights here, but Conchie has two teeth through. We've hit 9 months and our 40 weeks in vs 40 weeks out milestone and he's mastered pulling himself up to standing. I panicked slightly that it could mean walking soon, but I quickly checked and realised J was standing at a similar age, but didn't walk until he was 15 months, so hopefully we've got a while to go!

[Princess Morripov]

Yay for some teeth!

We’ve got no teeth but lots of standing now too. Tupac got his first teeth at 7 months but nothing here yet, doesn’t seem to stop him walloping everything down though, he’s like a bottomless pit I wonder if he’ll bang a few out all in quick succession.

He does seem to think it’s hilarious to stand up the second he’s put to bed and cruises around his cot for a bit before he conks out now. Usually in some kind of awful bum in the air, face down pose so I have to reposition him to be sure he’s ok and then he turns straight back that way anyway

I’m happy with early walking though, as I did find the crawling quite annoying as they don’t want to stay in the pram but it’s not safe to crawl on pub floors so a positive out of lockdown is that crawling has been less annoying than it was with Tupac

Little bruiser

[Rhodonite]

He looks like a proper little toddler now!

We don't have cruising yet, and quite often he gets the angle wrong when he's standing. So he ends up with his feet too far v back and holding on to something at almost 90 degrees, then cries because he's stuck, as he can't sit down!

I think J would like early walking to, he's dying to play with him properly.

[Princess Morripov]

Oh bless him

Tupac just likes to tease him and remain just slightly out of reach this is my current view

[Princess Morripov]

We seem to have a minimal clothing approach at most times, so it’s just as well we aren’t going anywhere

[Leap]

Look at him! Dead pleased with himself

Yay for teeth, Conchie! We had no pulling up until she was 11 months I think, and she’s still in that stage although I do wonder how much faster clever Conchie will do it with someone to copy! Hop is obsessed with the walker and makes a beeline for it then storms around everywhere, but independent standing or steps is rare for the moment. I am fine with her doing it in her own time as we also have no pubs to go to as yet.

I’ve been meaning to post that she fully turned a sleep corner about a week after her birthday - from 2 hourly wake ups to 5-7 hour stretches. We then had her 12 month jags on Wednesday and she was mostly fine, went to bed okay but woke at 11 for lots of crying and cuddling, then again a few hours later with a temp, but Calpol and cuddles and she was fine until the morning.

Our next hurdle is getting her used to the grandparents ahead of me going back to work. She will spend one day at my mum’s where there is a cot and a high chair etc so from Monday I will go round and try lunch & nap there, then build from there to get her used to days with Omi. PIL are much trickier as due to their house build delay for the first few weeks they will need to look after her in our house, where we will both also be working so it will be a bit of a mish mash but it’s only temporary. I still don’t really believe my life won’t continue in this play/feed/sleep baby bubble, but I’m willing to do these things just in case.