CONGRATS SARAH, ANDREW AND HARRY! And welcome little Milla, what a beautiful name!!!!
Lara - I understand you!!! After i had Ben everyone went on about "oh, you forget about the pain very fast dont you?" I could have punched them in the face. I still heard screaming in my head for weeks and weeks. Very traumatic. My birth was fast and hard (3hours). although fast and hard is always better than slow and drawn out. And, i was stil in pain for quite a while afterwards (BAD BAD piles TMI sorry) and then to top it off, i had an infection. It just didnt end. AND i had the WORST time breastfeeding
wow, maybe im not so clucky after all?
cOngratulations sarah!!! milla is a BEAUTIFUL name. looking forward to hearing the birth story if you choose to share it.
for me only 2 more weeks or so. but we have a problem with the name we chose : a few ppl have said to DH... Mylo? thats a milk drink, and now he's all unsure about the name which sux coz it was originally his suggestion. I always start with "only want positive comments coz it took us 6 months to agree", so everyone's been great to me. but someone even said to him "not Milo, that's my friend's dog's name". (one of my blokey women friends, would u believe). I've tried telling him to ignore them, someone'll always say something nasty about ANY name, but the doubt is already there. i could scream. shoulda told no one. I'm so OVER looking for names i refuse to do it again.
i noticed something about us women with kids - we love getting together. i had a baby shower on the weekend and all my playgroup friends came and got into it, the other (single girls/ first time pg friends) mostly didn't make it, so thank god for playgroup or it woulda been sad. as it was, it was awesome: there was heaps of women, lots of toddlers, 3 tiny babies, a smattering of men out back and the house was alive. the kids alternated between outside playing on the toys and creating havoc inside. us girls set out masses of yummy food and all talked at once, passing the babies around. it was 2 hours gone before we got around to playing the games, so we rushed into labour symptom heads (like celebrity heads but using terms specific to childbirth). someone was episiotomy and someone else was show, but we would have accepted bloody mucus plug, and there was of course excrutiating pain. another really good game was trashy maternity wear- garbage bags transformed into designer princess dresses and belly baring hooded gowns etc. i said no presents but everyone brought presents and food too, so there was an awesome spread. the boys stayed well away from games and missed out on all the party food, which was fine coz they fired up the bbq and broke out the beer. everyone was happy, the kids had a great time and our house feels thoroughly warmed. should be easy to organise play dates after that in order to get us through the xmas break.
last week of work for DH then he get 2 weeks holiday (but no holiday pay as he's casual... oh ****!) lucky we dont have to worry much about xmas presents (we're muslim). hope everyone survives the silly season!
congrats sarah on the safe arrival of milla...i have a little cousin by that name and she's very cute!
merry xmas and happy new year to all!
lara - have you had your bub yet?
nadine - any news on #2?
Anyone heard from snowy...i think about her quite often
kaydee - ben is soooo cute!
can you guys believe our kids are coming up 2 years old...where has the time gone?
we are all going really well. cale is such a happy content baby who pretty much only sleeps and eats, he rarely cries. he has already put on 2kg in 4 weeks not that you can tell he's so long and skinny. zara and aiden have been great with him. i can't remember not having him now! silly i know.
He was 3.38 kg, 51.5 cm, 33cm hc, and he is perfect!
I had a 9 hour labour just with gas, but the first 6 hours were easy! the last 3 hours were pure unadulterated agony, but this time it was pain on MY terms. I had a clear moment of connecting with Mylo when i realised i needed to work with him: like "C'mon Mylo, I'm gonna get u out", and i began to concepualise using the pain to push instead of resisting it by screaming. i actually felt him turn in the birth canal: it was bizarre! it was an amazing experience, so much better the second time, but it wasn't all over when he was out. I had 2nd degree tears and post partum haemoraging so they tortured me in horrible humilating ways for 3 more excrutiating hours (15 stitches). But in the end we are both ok and love being home as a family of 4!.
Olly is coping really well with the new addition to the family (i'm coping less well with having my mum stay to "help out"). Mylo is SO UNDEMAMDING as newborns tend to be, so i have been able to give olly all the attention he is used to, just i cant pick him up so easily. He is interested in Mylo without being obsessed or jealous (so far anyway) and Bonar is the proud happy daddy of 2 wonderful boys! he was great during the birth and has been awesome at home, but he goes back to work on Monday... lets see how i go then!
hope everyone had a good new year's celebration and 2008 is a great year for us all!! love, Lara Olly and Mylo xxx
Lara-CONGRATULATIONS on the birth of Mylo!!! What a gorgeous boy. I am glad everything is going well at home. Ouchies on all those stitches.
Narelle- No news yet. Still trying. This is our 6th month so I am hoping that we aren't to far away from getting a positive. Thanks for asking That's great to hear that Cale is doing well. Time sure has flown and I certainly can't believe that Kayla will be 2 very soon!
Katie- How are you and Ben going? Have you got any snow there?
Sarah- How are you going? How are Harrison and Milla doing?
I believe I read in the pregnancy announcements that Snowy is expecting bub no.3 It was a suprise but they weren't far off TTC anyway. She got a positive on new years eve!
Just wanted to pop in again and say the hugest congratulations ever to Sarah on the birth of Milla and to Lara on the birth of Mylo! How very exciting and wonderful! Wishing you a wonderful life together as family.
Not much news this end - we are off to see a fertility specialist finally on Thursday after 15 months of TTC. (including my 3rd m/c during that time). So, hopefully we will get things moving as it has been a bl***y long wait!
Take care girls and i will pop in again soon.
LSB xxx.
LSB- Aww, I hope you can find some answers. I sort of know what you mean. Although I have only been TTC for 6 months so I can only imagine how you must be feeling. to you and I hope your bfp is not far away.
ok ladies, i have posted my birth story so have a read if you dare. Kaydee it WAS better this time. i didn't go into the trauma stuff (that happened after the birth) coz i dont wanna scare people anymore than neccessary.
love lara
Last edited by xtml; January 9th, 2008 at 06:32 AM.
Sorry for being MIA for so long. With the whole cancer scare I stopped going online to BB and then when I was told they got it all, I kinda just forgot to come online... you know how life goes.. so I am back and yes, I am pregnant. Quite unexpected as we weren't ttcing yet but I am very happy. (just hoping the next pap is clear)
I still need to say BIG BIG CONGRATS TO:
Narelle on the birth of Cale
Sarah on the birth of Milla
Lara on the birth of Mylo
Zara is still her cheeky little monkey self. She sometimes gets herself in trouble, pounces on Wolf and then cries when he fights back (little drama queen). She still hops and skips and runs rather than walks. She talks a lot but not everything is telligble. Wolf said a lot more at her age - but hey, all kids are different. She is so stubborn and still throws herself on the floor when she doesn't get her way.
For Xmas Santa brought her a shop which she LOVES (as does Wolf). They love playing with the cash register, loading up the shopping basket and making food for Mama & Papa to eat. It's so cute.
AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
I haven't been checking the thread because i haven't been getting any reminder emails!!! I can't believe I've missed some posts.
First of all, Congratulations to you Lara!!! I'm so very happy to hear that you had a "better" birth experience. I will read your story as soon as I'm done here.
SNOWY! I can't believe you are back! I was so glad to see your post. Huge congratulations to you aswell! What wonderful news that you are doing well and are expecting #3!! I'm really very happy for you.
Ben also got a kitchen set for Xmas (pots and pans and cups etc...) he loves making "coffee" for mummy and daddy. We are always having tea parties and making "cakes". lol. How is Zara going with her language skills? Ben gets confused alot, which is understandable. Lately it's between "Out", "Auf" and "Aus". He is doing well though. We have enrolled him into kindergarden for August. I didnt want to send him - but after a long conversation with Dh we thought it might be good for him to interact in German more.
Nadine - DONT get me started about the snow. We havent had any yet! I really really hope some comes before Winter ends, but i have given up. No snow last year, no snow this year. What is happening to the world
Narelle - I'm happy to hear that Cale is doing so well. 2kg in 4 weeks??? WOW!
Ok, now our update. Things are going well for us. Slowly, but good. We are still planning on moving back to Oz when Dh is finished. He has one year to go. We have alot to organize, and still have to figure out how we will be able to afford it. AND we have to organize a visa for Dh (and apply for Ben to become an Aus citizen), but hopefully it will all work out.
We had a lovely Christmas. A friend of ours from Australia stayed with us over the holiday period. New Year's was very quiet. we didnt have a babysitter for the night, so we just stayed home and watched TV (*yawn*).
Good to read a post from you again!
So cute Ben loves kitchen / cooking stuff. I am forever pretend-eating fries and peas and sausages
Zara's speaking is pretty mixed. She will say "Zara auch!" if she wants something too (that Wolf has usually) but most other things she says are in English. She says cute little 3-word sentences sometimes, other times I can't make out a single word she is saying. Not knowing which language she is speaking doesn't help I guess... Wolf was definitely better at talking at this age. I was watching a video of him the other day with DH and we were both stunned at how well he spoke. He especially enunciated much better than Zara. She mumbles.. .lol.. well, she will get there.. she is still drooling like a champion which is very annoying as I have to change her tops twice a day at least.
Anyway, better dash and bath the kids!! We just got back from my dad's 70th birthday and it's bed time!
hi katie and snowy and everyone. Poor Olly has had a few hard weeks with a bad cold and an injury but has coped by having 2 daytime sleeps instead of one, on his initiative. clever boy. the story of his injury goes like this:
olly got his little face smashed up on the bus! The saddest thing is he LOVED the bus until now, now he’s scared of it (and so am I!). it was an old style bus that isn't wheelchair or pram friendly (downright unfriendly). To get on i had to let olly out of his pram, he went on and found a seat. then the fat bloated mean driver just sat there as i struggled to fold the pram with a newborn strapped to my chest
it's an impossibly big heavy pram so i couldn't lift it, a granny came and helped and together we got it thru the door, up the steps and into the aisle. But there's no space for luggage and the aisles really narrow so we had to drag it bump it into the passengers all the way to the back and then drag/hoist it up into a seat (really difficult even if you don't have a baby on your chest) at which point the bus takes off, olly falls off his seat (i'm still in the aisle, 2 meters from him, trying to get there) and he fell face first into the floor/step
and comes up screaming with blood spitting everywhere! i run to him screaming and crying too, grab him in a hug with mylo squished in between us and continue screaming everytime i look at his face. His lip swelled up 3 times the size instantly. So I’m on the floor holding olly, screaming hysterically, i cant stop crying, a couple of women come to help, including the granny, to help calm me down and make sure i dont squash mylo in my panic. They get us to a seat and put a tissue to olly’s face, there’s.blood everywhere, they ask where I want to get off the bus because I’ve lost all concept of where I am. All I know is my baby is hurt and my heart is breaking. Luckily mylo is ok, sleeping like a baby in his baby byorn. we get off the bus at the drs clinic and ask to be seen, crying the whole time and causing a scene in the waiting room. The Dr sees us quick and gives anti biotics and reassurance that it'll heal ok. After that I took him to daycare (walking distance from dr) but then i wasn;t brave to get another old style bus as I still had mylo in the pram, so how do I get home? i waited at bus stops 3 times but not one bus was pram friendly so i refused to get on. i ended up walking home (2 hrs in the midday heat, no hat or sunnies). this all happened 4 days ago and the swelling has finally gone down, but his top lip still looks bigger than usual. he's ok tho, they're built tough these kids!
otherwise he is doing really well with having a baby brother, is gentle and considerate (at his age!). he is, however, a little needy at the moment, bursting into tears at the slightest reason, but i figure he's just making himself more noticable now that theres competition for our attention. his language is much the same... he comes out with new words in English all the time, and understands whatever we say in Indonesian, but only says a few words at the moment. no words yet for wee or poo, so no where near toilet training. that's ok. no rush. toilet traning sounds like an extra work load for me anyway, so it can wait hehehe.
OH lara, Im so sorry to read about the accident. I can imagine what you went through! Germany is very baby-unfriendly. Public transport scares me so much when I'm alone with Ben. Stairs everywhere, no room for a pram... no WAY to get the pram onto trains and busses without a stuggle. I'm really happy I can now drive to places, but I get quite angry when i think about it - how isolated i felt (and still feel).
It's really funny sometimes because Ben would walk up to someone and start babbeling in his own baby language... but in the tone that sounds like a question. Most of the time he gets a "Im sorry ben, i dont understand English" thinking that he is talking english to them, or they look at Dh or me to translate. It's really cute. Basically if you just answer him with a Ja, yes, no or nein he will be satisfied and walk away.
Now his thing is when he drops something he says "OH NO!" or "OH NEIN!" depending on who he is around... other times it comes out like "OHHH NO-EIN!!" haha.
that's so cute! he adapts his exclamations to be language appropriate, clever too! Olly tries to say "alhamdullialah" when some one sneezes, but it sounds like "mmmmanamm lah"- but he gets the tone right! I'm amazed everyday when he comes outwith a new word (eyes, spider) or starts doing something new (putting dishes in the sink, rubbish in the bin... sometimes dishes in the bin and rubbish in the sink hahaha).
you know i'm amazed germany is not more child friendly. i tend to think of europe as being advanced compared to oz with regard to social arrangements - like paid maternity leave, institutionalised equality for gender and ability, good reliable public transport systems etc. i guess not. i know there's a lot of squatting but i thought it was just crusty punk fregan kids (like me in a past life) who choose that lifestyle to make a point about the wastefulness/ inequality of society. i think i just contradicted myself. i've never been to germany (obviously) but i've squatted/dumpster dived/busked the streets of England, USA and Spain. all the fun things u do when you have nothing to lose, no fear, no money and no responsibilities. so tell me, how is it really in germany, do you see a lot of evidence of homelessness/poverty and other indicators of inequality?
Lara- Sorry about Olly's accident. poor thing I can understand how you felt. Kayla had an accident a couple of months ago where a drawer flew out and hit her in the head. Blood was gushing out so fast and I was trying to stay clam but it wasn't easy! Anyway, I can't believe the bus driver was so unhelpful. I would have written down the number, not the time and gone and complained about him!!
I hope Olly's lip is recovering well though.
Katie- Aww how clever of Ben to know when to speak German and English. I should speak more German with Kayla, but I keep forgetting to. My mum speaks German with her so atleast that is something but I really do need to get my act together and try harder. I am sure I have heard her say "nein" a few times, but thats all. When I have talked German to her, she looks at me with a grin and it's almost like her face says "that's Omi talk" LOL. She thinks it's funny when I speak it to her!
Us- Kayla is going well. Talking more and more. Her favourite word atm is Noooooo, LOL. Not my favourite but I guess they all go through the stage where they use it more then needed, hehe. She has been syaing please and thankyou for quite a while now but her new thing is to say "thankyou mummy" or whoever she is saying thankyou to she will insert their name. She is still quite tall and I think she may be in size 3 come winter, unless she stops growing for a bit LOL.
Question: What are you doing for your toddlers 2nd birthday? What present(s) are you getting them?
I'll go first
What are you doing for your toddlers 2nd birthday? We are inviting about 10 families, so if all come we will be 26 people all up (incl. kids). I am planning on doing a butterfly theme and we will be having ice cream cake this year.
What present(s) are you getting them? The main present Kayla will get from us is a Step 2 kitchen. We bought it on the weekend. We are thinking of getting her a little bike aswell (one where you can stear with the stick at the back). From Nana and Grandad she is getting a dolls house.
Last edited by Nadine; January 29th, 2008 at 07:25 AM.
Hi everyone!
Our thread is getting more lively again! YEAH!
Lara - oh man, that sounds horrible!!! I can imagine your heart must have been bleeding Poor little muchkin. Hope Olly is healing okay.
Katie - really? it's that bad with public transport where you are? I dunno but Berlin was great. All stations had elevators (compared to 3 stations in total in London), you could just wheel on your pram, wheel it off, same with the tram. I don't think I ever took a bus but the metro and trams were excellent. Here in Switzerland it's awesome too. Elevators everywhere, the busses all have oodles of space for prams and they all lower down to the ground so you can wheel on the pram. Just London sucked out of the places I have lived in with kids so far. You couldn't even wheel down our pram because the alley was too narrow. I only ever took taxis after my first 2 or 3 nightmarish-experiences on the bus. Tube is horrible too because as I said, no elevators, stacks of stairs and no one willing to help you (only American tourists... so much for the English gentlemen.. they all plowed past me)
Nadine - we are having Zara' s birthday party at Gymboree. I think we will invite about 5 or 6 families (3 neighbours with 2 kids each, 1 friend from kindy with 2 kids, DH's cousin who just moved here with 2 kids.. and there's a few question marks but i might leave them as question marks...)
Us - all good. I am still feeling very nauseous but have only thrown up once so far (fingers crossed.. it wasn't pleasant.. my stomach hurt the rest of the day). Zara is also talking more and more every day. I love it when they can communicate what they want and don't want, what they see, etc. So much fun. I think she is more confused with the 2 languages than Wolf was and she seems to speak more English than German but that;s my fault, I don't speak enough German with her.
The transport is absolutely fine here, if i was traveling without a baby. I think that in city areas it's fine, but we are more in the country here. Most of the stations around here dont have lifts, just stairs. A majority of shops are 2 or 3 storey and only in the big chains (H&M, C&A) you are sure to find a lift. Although we do have trains that are okay for prams, we also get the older style trains that are a struggle. I hate the bus (always have since school days) - so i cant speak for the bus. i suppose most of the fear comes from having to ask for help. Although i could (in German) I still have a huge fear about speaking the language... and get panic attacks when i have to speak (long story, i need to work on it). I also suffer from mild anxiety, so that doesnt help either .
Lara - like i said, i live in more of the country area... I can't speak for the whole of Germany, but i think that Germany does well at looking after it's people. My husband is studying at the moment, and im a SAHM. Without the help that we get from the government we would be struggling to make ends meet. DH's wage isn't so great (yet). Child care is okay. Playgroup, preschool and kingergarden are free if you earn under a certain amount.
I was really suprised that Dh wasnt allowed Paternity leave. That was a huge problem for us. He had to take annual leave when Ben was born. He told me that fathers get about 2 days paternity leave.
I cant really say much, I've only lived here for 3 years. Snowy is German, so she can probably tell you more.
Ben is pretty clever when it comes from putting dishes in the sink. Every night before bed he has a drink of milk while we all watch a show together (in the night garden). As soon as his drink is finished he says "alle alle" (all gone), i ask if he is finshed and he says yes or no (depending if he is actually done). Then he turns the Tv off and then puts his cup in the sink and then heads towards his room. We love that he has such a set routine. It's brilliant.
OMG I havent even thought about Ben's birthday!! I'm not sure what we will do. Ben has a few friends at playgroup, but there are about 12 kids, and i wouldnt wait to invite a few and not the others. So i might not invite any of the playgroup kids. Plus, they all have birthdays around the same time.
We might just go with a few family and friends (+ bj's cousins baby who is 6 months younger than ben) to the local indoor playground.
We are looking at getting Ben a beanbag seat, or a kids couch or something. Im not sure what else. He got everything he "needed" for Xmas. I might tell people to put money in Ben's savings account instead of lots of presents.
Who is 2 first? Ben is on the 25th. I remember that he was the LAST baby to be born from Feb 06 bubs. 2 weeks overdue, hmpf.
Nadine - Ben is like that when I watch Neighbours (we get uk tv). He loves watching Neighbours with me because he seems really amazed that the characters speak "mummy language" haha.
!
). But in the end we are both ok and love being home as a family of 4!
. 
That's great to hear that Cale is doing well. Time sure has flown and I certainly can't believe that Kayla will be 2 very soon!
to you and I hope your bfp is not far away.
). Child care is okay. Playgroup, preschool and kingergarden are free if you earn under a certain amount. 
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