I started this blog a week ago, and am just now finishing it so please read it with this in mind since his birthday was on the 11th.

Nathan turns 2 today and I’m wondering where the last year has gone.  We seem to have been so very busy and yet we have done little.   We have spent lots of time at parks and other places away from home, simply because we don’t have the space for an active toddler in our flat.  That is one of the issues I find of living in a flat with young children, as there just isn’t the space for them to run around and do all the things toddlers want to do like kick balls and throw things.  So almost every day consists of getting organised and getting out in the morning, returning to the flat for a midday sleep, and generally staying home for the afternoon though we do try to get out for a walk somewhere even if it is only to the (small) playground at the front of our residential complex.  We will often do craft-type things in the afternoon and I fit cooking dinner in there somewhere.  Nathan loves helping cook where he can, so I get him to cut up softish vegetables and he will also stir things on the hotplate for me as long as the stirring is not too hard to do.

Sleep, now that is something that I spend an enormous amount of energy and time trying to make it happen and trying to work out how best to manage it.   There doesn’t seem to be any trend related to how busy/active he is during the day, how many hours he sleeps at night and/or during the day, or even how long it was since he woke from is day sleep.  What seems to work best is when he has an early day sleep (starting around 11:30 am) and waking up around 1 pm), but it’s by no means certain that this will result in a sleeping Nathan by 8:30 pm.  I’ve tossed around the idea of trying to cut out his day sleep, but that would mean that we could never leave the flat in the car or pram after about 11 am because he would fall asleep and there’s no way I can keep him awake (I’ve tried to keep him awake in the car and it’s nigh on impossible when he’s tired).  And it would be simply disastrous for his night sleep if he went to sleep in the mid afternoon!

Anyway, enough about sleep.  I have to admit that I didn’t know how quickly a baby grows up, how quickly they learn to walk and talk, amongst other things.  It never ceases to amaze me how interested Nathan is in numbers and letters, though he persists in jumping from 13 to 16 when he’s counting.  He knows pretty much all the letters, though there are a couple that he gets mixed up (like U and W).  He is so pleased that he can jump now, and likes to jump everywhere he goes.  He still loves kicking a ball (right foot only) but has not yet mastered catching at all. As for talking, he’s certainly got that under control though we do still have to decipher Nathanese at times.

I feel that all the effort that we put into elimination communication over the past 19 months has really paid off now that Nathan happily takes himself to the toilet (actually it paid off a long time ago since I haven’t had nappies, particularly pooey ones, to deal with for a very very long time).  He will move the step to the toilet, climb on, choose his seat (the toddler seat is inbuilt),  sit on it, close the lid and flush when finished, climb down off the step, move it to the sink, climb up and wash his hands.  Yes, we still prompt him to use the toilet a lot, and we do still have to help him undress (though he can take off his pants if they pull down easily and can nearly pull them up again), and we do still wipe him after poos (when do they learn to do that on their own without making a mess?). I’m sure he doesn’t remember a time when he didn’t use the potty, and I’m so pleased that I don’t have to start trying to toilet train my headstrong and willful child now!

I can certainly see a little, independent person rising up from babyhood.  He is a very helpful little person, but he knows what he wants and will try to achieve it on his own without asking for help.  This leads to clashes of willpower between him and Mummy or Daddy….Nathan who just wants to do what he thinks he needs to or wants to, and Mummy and Daddy who can see things going wrong as their little boy heads off without a thought of safety in his head.  Safety isn’t the only issue either; I just don’t think that we need all our eggs broken into a bowl simply because he loves cracking them and will go to the fridge and take out the eggs and put them in a bowl to achieve this.  And he doesn’t need to graze the fridge or pull out the milk by himself just because he decides that he needs some strawberries or a milk drink right now.   Still, I love that he enthusiastically helps with anything he thinks needs to be done.

I think that Nathan is very accepting of Toby generally, though I think he misses  being carried on my back or just at any time when he gets tired of walking.  Breastfeeding is our biggest issue, with me trying hard to keep him to his 3 feeds a day while Nathan often wants additional feeds (usually towards the end of the day when he’s getting tired).  More clashing of wills happen over this topic. At other times of the day Nathan will happily sit beside me and read books, or go off on his own missions, while I breastfeed Toby.

Just for posterity, a typical day looks like:

6:00 (give or take an hour) Nathan wakes up and had a breastfeed.
Sometime between 7 and 8 am he has breakfast
Between 8 and 9 am we generally get moving for the day and head off to where we will spend the day.  Mondays it is the Attachment Parenting playgroup which is often held at Sydney Park these days (since I always suggest that venue).  Thursdays it’s the pool for his swimming class and sometimes we head off to the Red Bus afterwards to see Mel and Sarah, and Fridays we often catch up with some people from my Mother’s group.  Tuesday or Wednesday we will go shopping, and the other day is usually spent at a park or the beach, weather permitting.  Other things we get up to are singing and story sessions in the library (though we haven’t been lately) and the Magic Yellow Bus which we’ve just started going to (the Marrickville version of the Red Bus).
11:00 am, snack before bed (fruit, sandwich, sushi roll (if we’re at the shops), etc.)
Between 11:15 am and 12:00 pm drive home, Nathan falls asleep in the car and I transfer him to his bed when we get home.
Sometime between 1 and 2 pm Nathan wakes up, has a breastfeed and a small lunch, depending on what he ate before his nap.
2 – 5:30 pm we do some activities that don’t require driving anywhere and include getting dinner organised
6:00 pm, start dinner
7:00 pm, have a bath
7:30 pm, brush teeth and read books
8:00 pm (can be as late as 8:30 pm, depending on what time Andrew gets home from work and how unsettled Toby is in the evening), breastfeed.  Sometimes he falls asleep in 15-20 minutes, but when he doesn’t…….
8:30 -10:00 (or later) try to get Nathan to put his head on his pillow and lie still so he can go to sleep.
10:00 (hopefully), he’s asleep.  At worst, he’s generally asleep by 11!

Happy Birthday my little boy!

A few photos from the last month:

Very excited about his new bike (2nd birthday present)

Birthday dinner at the Sushi Train in Newtown

Going on the ferry (we love $2:50 family funday sunday tickets for public transport)

Reading to Toby

Playing trains (track built by Daddy)

Pretending to be a baby on the change table

Generously sharing his toys with Toby (or trying to bury Toby, not sure which)

Having the occasional (ok, not so occasional) meltdown

Visiting the city on Sundays

Having fun with Grandma and Grandpa