On Monday Alicia started big school. She looked so beautiful in her uniform I couldn’t stop hugging her, which for once she actually loved. We have been talking about what to expect for a while now, focusing on how exciting and fun it will be at school. When we got there she just trotted off and started playing – phew! I was also very brave and felt fine until I was nearly back home when it dawned on me that my first born is now at school, then the tears came! I feel as though I have passed the first big test of parenting by raising and delivering her in one piece ready for her first day at school.

Alicia and her new friends will not be completing a full day at school for another four weeks to ease them into their new life. The first two weeks will be mornings only followed by two weeks of afternoons only. This seems really over the top to me and it is going to be a nightmare to get in to any sort of routine at all. My organised life is now in chaos again as I find my feet getting three children washed, fed and dressed ready for the walk to school. I can’t imagine how the Mums who work are going to cope with the half days and changing times. Never mind, one week down and we weren’t late once, gold stars all round!

On Thursday my handsome fella Sonny, my youngest baby turned one. More tears. Cliché I know but really… where did the year go????? Mark and I knew that having three pre school children would be hard, but that if we could get through the first year we would be fine. We had our closest friends and family round to celebrate, which also gave us an opportunity to say a big thank you to everyone who has helped us. With the new business Mark is rarely home so I have relied on my best friends and brilliant neighbours to keep me sane. I often say that the biggest difference between having two and three children is that when you have three you accept more of the help that is offered rather than being proud and trying to cope by yourself!

Sonny has been an angel baby and I have honestly enjoyed every minute of this first year with him. Maybe third time round I have finally cracked this mothering malarkey!

Proud Mum and Alicia

Alicia outside the school gates

My big boy

 

Sonny with his new toys

My eldest child, Alicia, is full of life. She is loud, showy, jumpy, clever, funny, independent and always needs to be the centre of attention. She is definitely the most demanding of the three Neilson babies. Since she turned three I have felt that she was ready for school and, I am a little ashamed to admit, that I was ready for her to go to school too! I thought that I would be one of those Mums who happily wave their child off at the gate, ready to enjoy a day with the younger kids, but now that the start date is just around the corner I think that I am going to be an emotional blubbering wreck. I’m really going to miss her!

Preparations are going well; the uniform has been purchased, shiny black school shoes are in their box ready to put on, labels have been ironed on, or stuck to, everything (try www.mynamelabel.com ), new pants and socks are ready to go, we have read books about starting school – Alicia is ready… but I am not sure that I am! Embarrassingly I even cried in the shoe shop – I was so proud. The shop assistant assured me that I wasn’t the first Mum to dissolve into floods of tears but I still felt like an idiot!

One week to go and I am making the most of the time with my special girl. Last week we went to the zoo and swimming, this week I plan to just have fun with Alicia before she embarks on this new stage of her life.

Alicia proudly showing off her shiny new school shoes 

After nearly 11 months of being breastfed Sonny decided he didn’t want me any more. Most of the time I’ve absolutely loved breastfeeding and I had decided to keep going for the year, but in the end Sonny made the decision for both of us. He really just lost interest in it and started to take less and less. I had been giving him a formula feed in the evening for a few months and he always guzzled it down, physically shaking with excitement when he saw it.

Even though I felt that the decision had been made for me, I also felt very guilty that I wasn’t giving my baby the best drink. In the supermarket I wanted to explain to anyone who saw me purchasing the formula that I had been breastfeeding for nearly 11 months and I wasn’t a bad mother even though I felt like it! I now give Sonny a bottle of cow’s milk in the morning and a follow on formula just before bed.

I feel very emotional that I will (probably) never breastfeed again, I actually feel a bit tearful just writing that down. Sonny is (probably!) our last baby and I am very proud that I fed him for so long. I will never forget the closeness of our feeding time.

On the bright side it does mean that I no longer need to wear horrible nursing bras!!! Yippee!!! I went into town and spent an absolute fortune on sexy underwear that doesn’t unclip at the top. My husband is equally delighted that he will never have to see a nursing bra again so we raised a toast and marked the occasion by burning the bras on our garden chiminea.

Sonny is also crawling at last. I was due to meet my friends for a run and he started just as I was on my way out of the door. I couldn’t believe it – for 11 months I have been with him 24/7 and he starts to crawl when I’m about to go out – typical! It’s going to be a nightmare now that all three of them are on the move!

A momentous occasion – the burning of the bra!

I’m really noticing that my girls are growing up. Gracie has turned from a toddler into a little girl. The main difference is that Alicia and Gracie play together; they play schools, tea parties, mummies and daddies. It has meant that I can sometimes leave them to play together whilst I get on with a few jobs – this is a real ‘treat’ as up until now I had been leaving all of the jobs until after the kids were in bed. It’s a mixed bag though as they seem to either be really close, and want to be on top of each other, or they are screaming and fighting – usually over one toy! It’s a real cliché and I am sure that I was the same with my sister but why do they start a tug of war over one toy when they have hundreds they could play with?! They also have proper scraps now, pushing, kicking and hitting each other. When they are good they are very, very good but when they are bad... it gets ugly!! Unfortunately for Alicia she can no longer tell small fibs about why Gracie is crying because Gracie’s speech has advanced enough for her to be able to say ‘Alicia hurt me’!

We received the report from Gracie’s speech assessment. Her development is at the lower end of what is expected for her age. The therapist thinks that this is because her older sister is so very vocal that Gracie doesn’t get a chance. I have also noticed that Alicia needs a lot of attention from me to keep her interested and well behaved – scarily I can see that she gets this from me and I often have flashbacks of how I was as a child! Anyway – the therapist wants to assess us again once Alicia has started school, she also gave us some advice on how we can encourage Gracie’s speech. We need to look at Gracie when we are speaking and encourage her to string three words together rather than two. She is definitely coming on.

Gracie has also started to potty train. I have had the potty around for a while now and I am very open when I use the toilet – ‘Mummy is having a wee on the toilet’ etc. Kids really learn from watching and copying Mummy, but I am looking forward to a time when I can go to the toilet by myself! This week Gracie has been taking her own nappy off and sitting on the potty – I am so proud! I do a little ‘wee and poo dance’ when Gracie has produced something on the potty, which she thinks is hilarious. I also make up little songs about how Gracie is brilliant to use the potty. I decided to just take her nappy off when we are at home so that she can feel if she has an accident, and there have been a few! For every wee or poo on the potty there has been a corresponding accident on the floor – I even caught her weeing in my shoe but I couldn’t be too cross as she obviously grasped the fact that she couldn’t just wee on the floor!

Gracie is no longer in a cot, she has now moved to a toddler bed!! I’m so proud of her – it’s such a huge milestone!

She made the transition easily and once she is in bed she generally doesn’t get out again. Having recently dropped her lunchtime nap she is usually completely exhausted by bedtime at 7pm. On the first night Mark and I heard a thump upstairs at about 7.30pm, but as it wasn’t followed by tears or other noises we thought nothing of it until we went to check the kids before we turned in… Poor Gracie was asleep on the floor – she must have rolled out!

I remembered a little trick that my sister-in-law had mentioned so thought I’d give it a go. Kerry used to roll a towel and put it under the mattress on the outside edge so that the mattress was slightly raised. This means that if your child rolls in the night he/she will roll towards the wall and not out onto the floor. We have had no more rolling out issues since!

My sleeping beauty