Tuesday 2 December 2008

Fingerpainting

I did some finger painting with the boys a few weeks ago. Adam thought it was a lot of fun...


But Isaac wasn't so keen.


But they both enjoyed the bath afterwards.





Ben slept through the whole thing of course.

Sunday 9 November 2008

A bit of an update

It's been a bit of a manic couple of months here in the Porter Cupboard. I've barely had time to scratch my head, let alone write anything.

Isaac has started school, at the ripe old age of 3. His teachers are wonderful and he is really enjoying it. Tomorrow he will be staying for lunch after his usual morning session. Unfortunately it's chicken sausages and fruit salad, which may cause some upset, and it will be at least a week until chicken nuggets and ice cream are on the menu again.

Every afternoon Leigh asks him what he did at school. The conversation goes something like this:
Leigh: "What did you do at school today, Isaac?"
Isaac: "play."
Leigh: "who did you play with?"
Isaac: "Franco-cisco."
Leigh: "and what game did you and Francisco play?"
Isaac: "running around and falling over."

And thus ends the discourse. His teachers assure me that he plays with all the children and joins in with all the activities on offer every day, but clearly the real highlight is his little bit of rough and tumble with this small Portuguese boy.

Adam is finally beginning to communicate with us. He is signing a few signs, especially "all done" when he's finished eating and said "car" this week for the first time. Quite a milestone, as it's his first word other than "mumma" and "daddy." The poor little mite is also cutting his 2 year molars though, so has been in absolute agony at night. Hopefully they'll be through quickly and not cause him too much more pain.

Little Benjamin is still sleeping all night and feeding very well. He loves his toys and watching us going about our business and is very tolerant of his older brothers' antics.

Friday 8 August 2008

Adam hates the swimming pool

As a special treat, Leigh took Adam for his first visit to the swimming pool. He was, as he always is, very excited by the whole outing. Until his big toe hit the water. Then he wept inconsolably until it was over. Hopefully a few trips to Bishop's Park and some time splashing in the paddling pool will help him get used to the idea.

We're all quite exhausted from staying up too late and being woken in the night by hungry little Ben, but everything is fine. When the midwife visited on Tuesday, Ben had gained a little weight, which I find quite amazing at 5 days, when they've usually lost a fair bit. He'll be weighed again later today so we will see exactly how much he's been eating!

Monday 4 August 2008

Baby Porter finally arrives

After what has felt the longest 9 months of my life, our 3rd little blessing finally made an appearance on Thursday 31st of July. He was born in a birth pool and weighed in at a healthy 8lb 5oz and arrived in the world very peaceful and calm, and demanding food.
The labour (once it got going properly) wasn't too long and the birth was hard work, painful but without any complications or problems.

He's feeding well and last night slept for six hours straight. So long, in fact, that I woke up with a stiff neck, unused to such long periods of uninterrupted rest. He doesn't have a name yet, but we're working on it. Isaac is delighted with his new brother, and Adam thinks he's hilariously funny.


Tuesday 17 June 2008

A couple of pictures and news

It's been ages since I updated this, so I thought I'd take a the opportunity offered by Spongebob Squarepants and get something written.

The last couple of months have been quite exhausting. I'm now really very pregnant and the boys seem to be taking turns at screaming in the night due to teething pains and colds, but we're all okay. Just counting down the last few weeks before baby arrives and trying to get as much rest as possible with so many people around!

Isaac was found to have glue ear a couple of weeks ago, which will be followed up in the Autumn. It doesn't seem to have affected his speech development, although the speech and language therapist suggested getting a referral to the ear, nose and throat specialists as he seems quite nasal and congested. We'll see what they say.

Adam is now starting to let go when standing up holding things, but isn't quite confident enough to attempt a step yet. But he thoroughly enjoys sidestepping around the furniture and attempting to climb over anything and everything.

Isaac's also been a very brave boy lately, trying all sorts of new foods including raw red pepper, potato waffles and strawberries. He seems to be slowly overcoming his fears of new foods and is experimenting with the things the rest of the family are eating. The potato waffles were the biggest success so far, and one of the only things to have been swallowed, albeit with a generous topping of Marmite (his idea, not mine.) Having tried every other thing I can think of to get him to eat new foods with no success at all, I've resorted to just giving him what he will eat, and doing the best I can to get a relatively balanced diet down him with the help of Innocent fruit smoothies and Hovis. The biggest change is that the stress and angst has been removed from mealtimes, as when he turns his nose up at something new on his plate or refuses to eat something he's had twenty times before and enjoyed, we just say "oh, okay" and leave him to pick at his plate, only commenting when there is something positive to say. It seems that his attitude towards food has changed, as he now gets very interested in fruit and vegetables, asking for cucumber or peppers to be cut up for him to try and stealing baby plum tomatoes. I think Adam's healthy appetite has helped him a lot. Sticking a bit of something from Isaac's plate into his brother's mouth will often result in it all being eaten or at least tasted.

Anyway, enough about that. We've not had a lot of outings, so there aren't many new pictures as I don't tend to take them indoors. But this is a snap of Adam meeting a squirrel monkey at an animal place quite recently. He was extremely excited and cracked up laughing. Later that afternoon, Isaac met a talking parrot, which took him by surprise with a parroty "hello". Isaac didn't actually believe the parrot was talking, thinking it was all a bit of a practical joke!
We did manage to get to Bishop's Park with Papa too, and had a lot of fun. Adam slept most of the time though.


So this baby should be arriving sometime in the middle of July. I will upload pictures as soon as I can after the birth.

Sunday 4 May 2008

Happy Birthday Adam!

Adam's first birthday was on Friday, so we celebrated with a birthday tea yesterday. Adam had a huge nap right before the party, so was ready to have a lot of fun and stuff his face with cake.


All the children (and some of the adults) were very impressed by the cake train (tin purchased from Lakeland), though like an idiot I forgot to take extra pictures of it. In this photo you can only see the square wheeled carriages done by Leigh, and not the engine and the ones I carefully decorated with round sweets and coloured icing. Two minutes later the entire thing was completely obliterated and all that was left were a few crumbs and half chewed licorice alsorts.


















































Adam had some lovely presents, all of which were thoroughly tested for chewability by grateful recipient.

Wednesday 16 April 2008

Signs of the times

Although feeling very unwell and sorry for himself with a stinking cold and gunky eyes, Adam signed "milk" for the first time this evening. So even though it was half an hour early, he got his bottle!

For those who don't know much about baby signing, it's a great way of teaching hearing babies to communicate long before they can speak. So although Adam has perfectly good hearing, we are teaching him to sign simple things like "milk" and "eat" so that he can express his wants to us even though his little mouth won't be able to articulate the words for months. Mummy is very proud!

Sunday 13 April 2008

Adam's first molar

Adam got his first molar! He also has diarrhoea and a very sore mouth.

Bathtime for the boys


Isaac and Adam love their bathtimes. Here they are saving water and enjoying lovely warm bubblebath.

Saturday 12 April 2008

So begins a new thing

Today, on a wet and exhausting visit to Queen Elizabeth Country Park, it was decided that since everyone else is doing it, I probably should too. So I set up this blog.