Bedtime shenanigans

Nana's visit came to an end today. Ella certainly enjoyed having her here, but her 7:30 pm flight departure time meant a break with our normal nightly schedule. Ultimately, after some prevarication, it was decided that Nat would take Katy to the airport to wave goodbye to Nana, while I would take care of Ella's dinner-bathtime-milk-play-reading-bedtime routine.

We find a stringent bedtime routine generally helps with enforcement of bedtime -- Ella knows exactly what is about to happen, so doesn't complain so much when it occurs. And tonight we sailed along pretty well, and I had her bundled her into bed to start reading stories at about the right time.

And that was when we departed from the routine. Firstly, Ella decided that she would read the book, not me. Fine, I thought. She hadn't read this one before, so she made it all up (just happened to be in tune to "two little ducks went out one day", which I thought was pretty cute). Then she started climbing off the bed, and turned around to say "Last story, go to bed NOW" pointing violently at me to accentuate her point. Hmm, perhaps she learnt that one off someone. At this point Ella stormed out of the room, and left me sitting on her bed as she shouted "see you in the morning".

Now, I'm sure a clever parent would have had a great management strategy to cope with this, but I was laughing too hard to think properly. In the end, my plan was to wait in her bedroom for her to come back. After 5 minutes, I gave up and went to look for her in the lounge-room. But she wasn't there. Wasn't in the kitchen either. Then I realised she had completed the role reversal, and was lying in my bed, pretending to be me. She continued the charade -- "back in bed, NOW" she told me, in no uncertain terms.

At this point I had no option; enforced bedtime was all that remained, and in the face of enforcement Ella wilted. We read another book (I read it this time) and the routine was complete. Fingers crossed, she appears to be asleep now ....

Spun Out at Floriade

Nana (Nat's mum), Katy and I picked Ella up early from childcare and headed over to Floriade - the annual flower display held at Commonwealth Park. Our priority was to visit the patting farm in the kids corner. This year the farm had chickens, ducks, kittens, lambs, goats, a calf, a dog, geese and rabbits. Ella's favourite this year was the cat with her 2 kittens who were in a small cage out of reach to the kids hands. After exhausting the animals, we ventured around the masses of flower beds pointing out all the colours. This year Floriade has a giant ferris wheel, 35 metres tall. Unfortunately Nana wasn't too keen on the height of this ride so we opted to go on the teacup ride which looked much more placid. Looks can be deceiving! For a kids ride, those teacups spin pretty quickly especially when the operator gives them an extra boost as you pas him on each lap. Lets just say Nana was feeling a bit dizzy and sick!

Look at all these flowers!

The Teacup Ride!

A Lucky Escape

It is true that babies do bounce as I found out the hard way on Saturday. Katy had just dozed off to sleep in my arms so I placed her back in the rocker which was on the kitchen bench and didn't strap her in. I was cutting up potatoes for dinner when I heard this thump followed by loud crying. I turned around to discovered Katy face down on the kitchen floor. She had managed to very quickly and quietly wiggle out of the rocker and fall. Luckily her feet hit the ground first followed by her tummy and then her chin/face. Mum who was asleep at the time, woke up to the thump, cries and my swearing. Katy settled down pretty quickly and on closer inspection there were no signs of major injury.

I called Sandra (Andy's mum) to get some advise on what to do - should I take Katy to hospital or not? On answering the phone Sandra's first words were something like "Why aren't you watching the AFL?" St Kilda and Geelong were playing in the grand final with only minutes to go and St Kilda was leading by 1 pt. I should point out here that Sandra is a Geelong supporter. "No I have a bit of an emergency here" was my reply.

After various questions it was decided no trip to the hospital for Katy but just to keep a close eye on her. Had to watch for any signs of unusual drowsiness, vomiting, funny pupils, fits or unusual crying. Katy by now was asleep - tired from the shock and all the crying.

A little later we woke her up for a bath which she enjoyed and then tried to feed her. However she wasn't keen on drinking - not sure if it was a sore neck, lip or jaw. Getting a bit worried as she hadn't had any milk since 2.30pm and it was now 8pm. Sandra came around to check her out. We gave Katy some panadol and then syringed about 80ml of milk into her. Happily she drifted off to sleep.

The night wasn't as bad as expected and involved giving Katy panadol every 4 hours. She also managed to breastfeed at 11pm and 6am which was great. By Sunday morning, Katy was back to normal. The only sign of the traumatic experience was a graze on her chin and a little bruise on her bottom lip.

As for me, well I was pretty upset. In fact Andy said he was more worried about me than Katy. As time passed by and Katy began to act more like herself I became happier. Also after to talking to various people who all recalled an accident story involving them as children or their own babies I realised I wasn't a bad mother and that accidents do happen. Lest to say it gave me a big wake up call and a difference perspective on life.

Nana Arrives

Nana arrived here on Friday night on a big plane (according to Ella). Ella and Katy have enjoyed spending time with Nana. The weather has been abysmal - it feels like we have gone back in time to the middle of winter. Cloudy, rainy and a chilling wind. Apparently it was a top of 8C today the coldest September day in 40 yrs! This means we have spent most of our time inside having cuddles, building towers, constructing a railway and drawing on the blackboard as seen below.

Spring

After noticing our Pacific Blue tree has begun to blossom Ella, Katy and I wandered around the garden taking photos of flowers. I used the macro setting on the camera which worked a treat.

Now talking about spring where has it gone? I can't believe that it's forecasted to be a maximum of 10C and 11C this weekend. I feel particularly sorry for mum who I'm picking up from the airport in an hour - she thought she had missed the Canberra winter!

Buswash

Today Ella's childcare went on a buswash excursion! So although today isn't one of Ella's normal childcare days, we joined in on the excursion. Now what does a buswash excursion involve? Well the big orange action bus arrived at childcare and all the kids and adults piled on. Once loaded off the bus drives to the depot. We tour the depot (on the bus of course) - including driving through the bus hospital, waving at the bus doctors (mechanics who squirt us with water), going through the buswash and then driving through the bus parking tooting the horn and yelling 'wake up buses!!' Poor Katy who was peacefully sleeping got a bit of a fright with 38 kids yelling this out. The excursion took just over an hour and we finished off by singing the wheels on the bus all the way back. A great way to spend the morning.

:)

It's amazing what a good night sleep (ie 11 pm -5am with no interruptions) and a morning run will do for the energy levels and general outlook on life. The run was my first with Katy in the pram (her 2nd) and so we ventured around the Streets of Cook (our winter blob loop) so there weren't too many bumps. Pippa came along too and helped pull Katy up some of the hills. Also my calf seems to be better - touch wood....