Getting the hang of it...

I'm going to regret saying this, but I think I'm finally getting to grips with two babies. Obviously, we still have our tough moments, well, tough days. But I finally look forward to getting up and spending the day with my little offspring. Alba seems much more settled, although she is still being sick for England. Jacob wasn't a sicky baby at all, I think he was only ever sick about 3 times and they were during chemotherapy. Alba, however, likes to be sick ALOT. And it comes out of her nose nearly every time. And her little face when she panics about it breaks my heart. My mum tells me I was exactly the same, every single time I was sick. As a child with a sickness bug, she would have to hold my head in the toilet otherwise it was like the fountains at the Bellagio in Vegas. I would decorate everywhere with sick. And to be completely honest, I'm still terrible now. I absolutely freak out every time I'm sick and cry like a baby. Which is why I have so much sympathy for my little doll. She seems happy enough otherwise though, which is brilliant. She sleeps so well at night and has slowly started to go longer between her bedtime bottle and night feed. So hopefully she will drop it soon enough and sleep through! Which would be AMAZING as Jacob didn't sleep through until Alba was born, which is weird. But I'll take it!

 Co-sleeping. Again. 

Night Monkey Day Monkey is by far my most favourite book of Jacob's at the moment. 

Today was a day of achievements for me, I braved going into town with both children by myself. We never bought a double pram as they're so huge and Jacob likes to walk alot anyway. Instead we got a buggyboard for Alba's pram. They're brilliant! Jacob thinks it's a ride so is happy stand on it when we go out. He does get off and walk a bit, but I bought reins for him so I don't have to leave the pram in the middle of the street to chase him if he tries to run away. I know a lot of people don't like kids wearing reins, but when you have a boisterous little boy like mine, they're necessary. I actually had a girl of about twelve point to Jacob and say to her little friend (in the most chavtastic voice) "I think that's disgusting!" She had to settle with a glare and me asking her "what did you say?!" as she was only 12. Had she been older I may have ran her over with the pram. Her friend then tried to fix it by saying "oh no he looks cute!!!" Damage done my friend. Yet another reason to dislike the youth of today. So, we managed to get round the whole town centre, actually go in about five shops, browse, queue and purchase things and then get home without any hiccups. I felt so pleased with not only myself, but so pleased with Jacob for behaving the whole time. The first time I went on my own, I ended up calling Rich to come and save me in Asda as I was on the brink of a meltdown.
Second achievement of the day; both babies are napping at the same time. I'm sure any parent of two little sleep stealers know how amazing this feels. So, I've taken the opportunity to write this, and to drink a HOT cup of tea. Most of the time, my tea is of a dodgy, lukewarm temperature. Or just cold. So a nice hot cup is just fabulous.
And the final achievement of the day; we went out to dinner! With the kids! It's my brother's birthday so we all went to dinner, which was lovely. I fed Jacob before we left as he normally has dinner around 5.30 and we wasn't going out until 6.30, plus, I knew he wouldn't eat out as they have a play area where we were going so getting him to sit still would be troublesome. But Rich and me both managed to eat our dinner without running for a muslin, or chasing Jacob back to the table, or chasing the dog out of the room so Jacob doesn't throw all of his food at him! It was bloody lovely! I even had a glass of wine. As Charlie Sheen would say, winning!

Jacob was so emotional on Thursday after his hospital appointment. Every little thing made him cry, and his eye was so sore and swollen, it looked like he'd been punched. It's gone down now, but getting him to have his eye drops was an absolute nightmare. I have never tried to bribe a child so much in my life. 

Bribery has been a theme of the last week, after the news that Jacob hasn't gained weight in about six months, I've been experimenting in kitchen a bit more. And trying to get him to eat more foods. More meals mainly. I've been adding cream to mash, cheese to pasta dishes, cream to scrambled eggs. Some of it works, some of it doesn't. Which is where I start bribing. Mainly with these Peppa Pig chocolate lollies that he is obsessed with. But it doesn't work. We've been good though, despite the total meltdowns, he doesn't get the lolly if he doesn't eat his dinner. As he is still young, I don't leave him to go hungry of course. Although I have been told he is old enough to not get  anything else if he doesn't eat dinner. I won't let him go to bed hungry, so he can still have fruit and yogurt for desert. Just no naughty treats.
I made cheese and broccoli savoury muffins yesterday. Silly me thought that because they looked like cakes, he would eat them. So when Jacob asked for "cakey", I took the opportunity and gave him one of the muffins I'd slaved over. He looked at it, licked it, then looked at me and said "No mummy, cakey!" Handing it back to me. Fail. The kid isn't silly. To be honest, I am so unbelievably crap at baking, (I actually forgot to put the milk in the muffin mix, but they still looked okay so served them up anyway.) So I'm not surprised he didn't want them. Next time!