Learning to crawl

Since mid-Dec Charlie has been on the move. He's not yet managed to crawl forwards yet but is so so close! He can crawl backwards and can flip over and turn around, so even though he's not a proper crawler yet, he's incredibly nippy and able to get anywhere he wants to.

We are therefore in the midst of baby proofing the flat. Our small Ikea Billy bookshelves containing glasses and alcohol is now a cupboard, we bought the doors on the weekend. We also have the choice of buying more of the mini Billy doors for our 4 larger bookcases, but seeing as the only parts accessible are Tom's comic books and my photo albums and cookery books, for now we are keeping them as shelves and will see how C-bear gets on with them.

Next weekend T's parents are coming to help us attached the TV to the wall and move the sofas around. I'm quite excited about the prospect of a new look living room and love planning where everything will go!

I love that I get to see this little face every day!

Learning to clap

Over Christmas both Nana and Granny tried to teach C-bear to clap, all that hard work has paid off, he's almost there and in quiet moments will stealthily practise!

PS. Note that I call him a good boy and then he immediately goes to chew up the magazine. Luckily this is the one we've kept for him to rip off, he loves magazines and we've had to stop storing them under the coffee table!

PPS. I'm feeling a little better about nursery, he had another 2 hours on his own there today, he had fun and I got a little time to think about cleaning the flat. It's not had a proper clean since before C was born, so is in need. Like Monika from Friends this actually excites me - sad huh!

Nursery - eek

This week C-bear started nursery. I can't believe my maternity leave is almost over, I can't believe I won't be with my little guy 24/7 and above all I can't believe Charlie is 8 months old - wow 8 whole months and he's grown so much. But back to the topic, nursery eek. Yesterday was horrible, I took him into the baby room at nursery and stayed with him for two hours. The nursery is lovely, they have lots of activities, nice carers and it's bright, clean and full of toys. But it felt so wrong. For the past 8 months I've been C's 1on1 carer, I'm right by him when he bumps his head, or has a cough or does something new and clever and now he'll be going into 1on3 care, his key worker is lovely but she has 2 other older babies to keep her eye on, my little love won't be the centre of attention and I feel so bad that I won't be there.

Today was slightly better, I took him in at 9.30am, handed him straight over and came back to collect him at 11.30am. He was absolutely fine, had fun playing with musical instruments and had raisins and breadsticks at breaktime. He was rocked to sleep and put in a cot, but only napped for 5 mins because of all the noise. The whole morning tired him out, he slept in the buggy on the walk home and didn't wake when I transferred him to his cot (yay).

Let's see what tomorrow brings.

Our first family Christmas

This Christmas was special, it was the first time in 11 years that Tom and I had spent it together and of course, it was Charlie's first. We spent the first week with Tom's parents in Bexleyheath and drove to Wiltshire on Boxing Day to spend a week with mine. We saw friends and relations and Charlie was incredibly spoilt with plenty of presents to unwrap, roast dinners to eat and relatives to play with.

Here are a few of my favourite snapshots of the Christmas fortnight