Another tooth!

Today I spotted another tooth on Owen's bottom jaw next to the first tooth. I must say this last week has been a bit up and down. Owen has had a cold & cough again which seems to coincide with the tooth coming through. And not by coincidence either that Brendon happened to be out of the country on business. Owen has not been able to sleep properly in the night as he has had a blocked nose so we have to give him a couple of squirts of nose spray. This must definitely wake the neighbours as he screams on the top of his lungs for a few minutes before settling again.

Thursday with the day mom (gastouder) went well during his wake time but he did not want to go to sleep. Annette called me to say she thinks it is the new environment and it was probably best to fetch him. By the time I picked him up he had been awake for 4 hours. I put him in the car seat and no sooner had I driven out of her street he was asleep. He did manage to stay at Annette's for 3.5 out of the 6 hours. Lets see how this coming Thursday goes.

Owen has developed an obsession - the vacuum cleaner. He probably got this from when Brendon used to put him in the pouch in front of him and do all the vacuuming on weekends. Owen cruises around now at a rate of knots. On all fours, on his belly with just his arms or on his belly with arms & legs. Sometimes I hear thud, thud and there he is under the coffee table trying to sit up. He has learnt to carry on crawling to the other side to sit up properly without bumping his head.



He now has learnt the word NO. He loves me saying no to him. When he is up to no good and I say no he turns and smiles. Then before I have even said it again he turns and smiles again................mmmmm. Owen is having a tough time sleeping now and I sometimes find him hanging on the bars of his cot on his knees wailing that he can't get down. No sooner have I disentangled him when he is back up there again repeating the same problem. Hopefully it is just a phase.

We all attended a birthday party on Saturday. Sam, Catherines son, turned 5 so we went to Joepie Speelpaleis and then onto hers for lunch. Owen got to join in pass the parcel at the end of the game (as you can figure that once he got hold of the parcel it would have either been shredded or there would have been tears from not wanting to let it go). Brendon ate the present which were smarties. Owen did get to have a first taste of butter cake filling. His eyes lit up!

There are a lot of noises coming from him now in the form of babababa, wawawawa. I have been trying to brainwash him into saying "mama". Hopefully this will be his first word. Then all the hard work would have paid off.



On a final note - alas the weather is getting cooler and the sunrise later each morning. Autumn is imminent. What activities to plan for Owen in Winter? He loves the outdoors but I suppose donned with hat, coat, gloves and scarf we will have to put on our happy faces and wait for warmer weather again next year!

9 Months Old



I cannot believe how quick these past 9 months have gone. Brendon & I are enjoying this age as Owen interacts a lot now and is developing his own personality. Today we went to the clinic for his 9 month check up. He now weighs 10.870kg's and is 77cm in length. The nurse was happy that he passed all the tests she gave him. On the weekend Brendon did some transplanting of plants in the back garden and Owen watched. He loved the jet nozzle hose pipe that Brendon sprayed near him. We continue to feed the ducks and cycle on the weekends. The gym creche is still an issue. I am convinced he is in co-hoots with the gym management to get me to have a longer gym contract to lose the extra kilos.



This coming Thursday Owen will go to a "gastouder" (guest parent directly translated) for 6 hours. This will be a weekly event so that I can study and Owen can start to interact with other little people. He had a trial run with Annette (the gastouder) and when I went to fetch him she said that he did not even miss me! Annette takes care of Owen along with a maximum of 3 other children (at different ages but still below 4 years old) in her home. The idea is that it is home away from home. The Dutch are so organised. Everything the children need are there. The only things I have to bring are nappies and food. He gets his own bed, feeding chair and there are loads of toys. Annette also likes the outdoors so Owen will appreciate the walks they will go on.

Owen to the barber

Today Owen's locks got the chop. Mom & dad decided it was time. So into his feeding chair he did go and one, two, three...................ten, eleven, twelve snip snip snip. Mom held his ears down and dad bravely took the scissors to his hair. It was going well until Owen clapped eyes on the scissors, which he obviously has never seen before, and decided he had to have them. A bit of a tussle ensued. We went a bit short on the overall look but felt that there was really not enough for a hairdresser to do.



The last few times that Owen & I have been to the gym, and Owen goes to the creche, has been a drama. Friday I just knew that he would cry so I gave him to Marion, the creche lady, along with usual instructions and bolted right up to the cardio section. Normally I cycle to warm up and then run, step and cool down. This time I jumped straight on to the treadmill and ran as fast as I could. 16 minutes later I heard the intercom go on but no message. I just knew it was Owen. A minute later the receptionist, who I know personally now from this whole saga, was at my side telling me Owen was crying. I now have a plan with Marion - to take Owen when she is there and for only short periods at a time in the beginning and then lengthening it. Ok, roll on Monday!



In the meantime Owen still enjoys his milk - whether it comes from the boob or the bottle seems immaterial to him. Mealtimes are still a real joy and he continues to feed himself successfully with his fork. Dad time is very special too. When Owen woke up on Friday morning he was very interested to know who was asleep in the bed next to mommy. A priceless smile melted dad's heart! Brendon spends Saturday mornings with Owen doing domestic duties and cycles with him in the afternoon after Owen's dinner. Still no appearance of the next tooth!

A week of go go go!

It has been a very different week. Owen has developed so quickly in a number of areas it amazes me. The gate is up on his bedroom door frame and I must say that I feel so much better popping upstairs to the loft and not fearing that he will fall down the stairs. He has become so active in such a short time. The carpets slow him down but when he gets going on the tiles and laminate he is a real speed monster. He loves sitting in his feeding chair, holding a toy over the side of it and watching it drop to the floor. He finds it even more amusing, once he wails that he doesn't have a toy in his hand anymore, that mom bends down to pick it up EVERY TIME! The small things that he does makes me realise just how much he has learned in the last few months. Less than 2 months ago we started using his next level car seat. Now when I unbuckle him and the straps spring back he lifts his little arms so that I can remove them and he be lifted out. Amazing. Even when he is engrossed in playing with his toy he still does that. He holds his sippy cup really well and insists that he holds his bottle when it is milk time too, even though he has been a breast-feed baby! Marina (in the next street) took him for an hour the other day and commented on just how independent he is as he did not cry once I had left & was so curious about every detail in their house. Jip, that's our little Owen.

Today was a rainy day so we managed to pop out for a 30 min walk in the morning. There was lots of playing going on. Owen loves positive praise. He takes all 4 plastic rings off the fisher price stacking toy and glows when I clap my hands and call him a clever boy. Daytime sleeps were a struggle and totalled only 1h15m. After one of his sleeps I heard him making a noise in his cot so I went to check on him and got the fright of my life. He was sitting up in the cot playing with "Mickey Big Ears". He has never gone from lying to sitting before. I guess he must have pulled himself up using the bars. Needless to say Owen & the mattress were out of the bed in a matter of minutes and I was adjusting the height of the bed to make sure there were no accidents.

Dinner was a gamble. On Sunday one of the ladies from the church gave me 15 pots of deluxe baby food (Eur 3.50 for 2 pots nogal!) The only problem was that there are only two varieties - ratatouille & chicken curry (baby strength). So tonight we tried chicken curry with mom's trusty faithful home-made pots in the fridge on stand-by. The first couple of spoons made him shoot me a "you've gotta be kidding" look. After a few more spoons and Rudolf the Red nose Reindeer song he finally decided that it was good stuff. Dinner ended off with a lolly shared by both of us. I enjoyed teaching Owen how to eat it. I would take a bite and go "mmmmmm" and then hold it out to him. He would take a suck and look at me and smile although I could see he was battling with the new cold feeling. What a funny boy.

The baby monitor has been banned from our bedroom during the night now. Owen is such a wriggle-pot every move used to wake me up. He does sleep on his tummy now which concerns me but I just have to trust the Lord that he will be fine. Owen doesn't get me up in the morning anymore. The sound of the neighbours house sitters alarm clock at 5am and Brabant accent calling the bulldog "beauty" inside the house is what gets my day started. Never have I wished the neighbours a speedy return from their holiday like now.

I must say that I am REALLY looking forward to Brendon being home tonight. Not to physically help with Owen but for me to mentally have a rest. Lets see what the next week brings.