Learn to Swim

After three months of age they reckon it's OK to start taking your kids to the pool, so given that both Mummy and Daddy like swimming (as does G in her bath) we thought we'd give her a try at the local pool.

The first time in she seemed to really enjoy it. I also looked, but they didn't seem to have any sort of water familiarisation classes for babies under 1 year of age so did some research on the internet.

I found this site, with a program by Laurie Lawrence (yes... that very loud swimming coach) on how to prepare your baby for swimming and water safety. At this stage, it's mainly developing her ability to hold her breath in preparation for submersion. So what we are doing is sitting her up in her bath, getting her attention by saying 'Genevieve, ready... go...' and then tipping a cup of water over her face. She's really picked it up well. We can do it three or four times in a row now and she knows exactly what's coming. She closes her eyes and holds her breath when you say the preparation words. Click on the picture to go to the site for more detail.

We're hoping that once she gets a little bit older that this will encourage her to enjoy the water and learn how to swim from an early age, which is a good thing. I wonder how old she needs to be before she can start surfing...?

Bathing beauty

Genevieve is growing so much that she has almost outgrown her little plastic bath that Nah-nah gave her. She doesn't like lying down in it anymore as she touches each end and she has developed a preference for sitting up at the end of it all squished up.

So this weekend we bought a bath seat for her so that she can sit upright in the big bath and we can wash her without her slipping under the water. We tried it out for the first time yesterday and as you can see it was a hit! She was giggling away and really enjoyed being a big girl in the big bath.

No 1 Support Crew

Last year I was quite surprised with the relative ease in which I completed the 'Around the Bay in a Day' bike ride. It's around 210kms! Naomi was training to do it too, but a certain little girl growing inside of her put stop to that.

Well this year, it's Naomi's turn. So Genevieve and I are there for support. She's doing it with the team we both trained with last year, 'Team CPA' - comprised of a bunch of soon-to-be-ex-work-buddies (I'm moving on), CPAs and taggers on (such as my mates Brendan and Dean). Anyway, this year Brendo is up again, and Naomi is taking the opportunity to ride with the Team CPA training rides as often as Genevieve's Sunday-morning timing allows.

This morning was a great day - not overly cold, with very little wind, although there was a little more headwind to start. Even so, with topping up Genevieve in the car just before Naomi left, G was pretty keen for her next feed by the time Naomi got back. So, once Naomi extends the duration of her ride, it's looking like we'll drive down and meet her at the half-way point.

A room of her own

Being a parent is full of many trials and tribulations - most of which we spare you the detail of, but I'm sure you've heard it all from others. One aspect that you don't hear all that often is how bittersweet them growing up is.

Every time Genevieve does something more advanced, we get really excited and almost overcome with joy. However, it also indicates that she's growing up and things are changing.

For a while now, Genevieve has been becoming far more vocal. This, unfortunately, also happens at 3am. So we'd been putting it off, but we thought it was pretty much time for her to go into her room each night, instead of next to us in her cradle. She'd been having the odd afternoon nap in there, with her little aquarium, so it wasn't like something completely new for her.

But, it was new for us. We put her down slightly later than the normal time (around 8:30pm) and she slept really well. But I know that I definitely woke a few times and even though she was only in the next room, I had to strain to hear her breathing. It was only when she moved or grunted that I was comfortable that all was ok.

(And of course I know that she was going to be fine, but I suppose natural protective instincts were kicking in).

So now that she's sleeping there, we thought that we'd better finish setting it up too. Naomi had bought some vinyl aquatic characters around 6 months ago. So we finally got around to buying an aquatic-themed border. (And for those of you who used to follow the BabyBoardy blog, the Hawaiian girl one didn't get the go-ahead). So now there's no mistaking it's Genevieve's room.

Editor in Chief

Here's Naomi at Now and Gen central putting the finishing touches to another post.

And little did you know, that it's all under the watchful eye of our little Editor in Chief, who personally signs off on everything we do (once we wipe the drool off).

Daddy the Mechanic

Just as I was readying myself to leave work this afternoon I received a call from Naomi. She was stranded at a friend's place with a flat tyre. Not with the new car mind you - with Genevieve's stroller. They'd tried to reinflate it, but it just went flat again.

I rode there and half-pushed, half-carried the stroller home, while Nai pushed my bike. After about half the journey, we noticed that both of the back tyres were now flat.

Once home, I managed to put my bicycle maintenance skills to good use, and after finding a single, quite large thorn in each tyre, there were patched, reassembled and inflated, ready to travel many more kilometers.

Ch..ch..changes

Yep, she's broken her all-time record for changes of clothes in a single day. Today, we had:

• change because of wee leakage (from accidentally tucking her singlet into her nappy so that was my own fault)
• change because of vomit
• change because of copious drooling
• change because of poo leakage (which isn't too uncommon, with the size she manages to deliver these days)!
• change after bath time

Oh... and yes, that's also not including the bibs changed, otherwise there would have been more!

So what's she saying?

So what's she saying?

Watch the video

Finally, through the wonders of modern technology... we can offer some sub-titles!

Suckyfist!

As we've mentioned previously, Genevieve loves to suck her fist. As with most things, we've looked it up and it's standard kid behaviour as they become more aware of their bodies and their environment.

What we have been keeping a watch on is that she is doing 'Suckyfist' and not 'Suckythumb'. Depending up who you listen to, or what you read, the thumb could develop into a nasty habit. We've tried, a few times, to substitute a dummy (which is far easier to control - you can't really take away her thumbs!) but she's not interested.

We're not overly concerned, however, as she is really more just chewing and exploring at this stage. So, on the odd occasion when it isn't her fist, it's 'Chewythumb' more than 'Suckythumb'. Many of the advisors/books also say that it's all perfectly natural, and not an indicator that she'll suck her thumb as a habit. Similarly, even though she favours her left hand, it isn't an indicator that she will be left (or right) handed.

Still, it can be most annoying when she's doing it at 2:23am and you are trying to get some sleep! (But cute, otherwise).

Snoozes

Genevieve is still generally sleeping very well at night, usually only waking for a single feed. Her morning time is often quite good too. After cheerful burblings and watching us eat our breakfast, she'll get 1-2 hours. But later during the day, it's another matter. She will generally still only snooze for one 'sleep cycle', so that means around 45 minutes or so. So she ends up overtired, and often a bit grumpy.

So, when she does decide to sleep for a while, you definitely let her. Here she is, after a big day of visiting Daddy in at work, sleeping off the rest of the afternoon in her stroller. Yep folks, that's around 3 hours! Perhaps we should try the stoller more often?

Call Ashley and Martin

Marilyn (Nah-nah) has let us know (and we have the photos to prove it), that the lovely long black hair Naomi had when she was born started to fall out after around three months. The thick dark hair I had when I was born just gradually turned blonder (and of course, must have turned to mouse-brown before finally, reaching the grey it's turning now!)

Well, as much as we hate to admit it, it appears that Genevieve's luscious locks are also going south. Her hair is still growing, but it is dropping out faster than it gets replaced.

I suppose one saving grace is that seeing how it is Winter, she tends to wear hats when she is out of doors anyway. Poor little girl.

Stand up and be counted

During tummy time and naked time, there's a series of exercises we put Genevieve through, so that she can build up strength in her muscles. One of these is to gently pull on her arms so that she will sit up, as this helps with her neck muscles.

We've been doing this for many weeks now - pretty much since she's had the strength to support her head.

Anyway, for the past few weeks she'll still go to a seated position, but she'll take this to the next step and stand up. She can't balance, but she can support her weight for some time. So here's a picture boys and girls...

No accounting for taste

Today as I was trying to get Genevieve to take some expressed milk from her new special "magic cup" (we have given up on the bottle as she screams so much when it comes near her) she was chewing away on the spout but didn't seem to be getting anything. So after she had been going for half an hour and was getting a bit over it I decided to give the spout a go to see if anything was coming out. The result was me getting a mouthful of warm breast milk. YUK! It was sweet and thick and milky and warm.... I felt quite ill afterwards. I won't be doing that again in a hurry.

4 month check up

Today was Genevieve's 4 month check up and immunisation with the maternal nurse. Given her recent form in the sleeping (or not sleeping) stakes we were sure that she must have grown. And sure enough - she had! Coming in at 62cm in length and 5.3 kg in weight she is still on target for 50th percentile length and head circumference. She is still below that for weight but Wendy said that breast fed babies often have that growth pattern and usually start putting on more weight between months 5 and 6. My mum also said that in size Genevieve is very much like me as I was quite a small baby until 6 months when I started to gain weight. I am hoping that Genevieve is going to be a bit taller than me though!

Genevieve is also doing everything that she is meant to be doing developmentally so Wendy was very pleased with her progress to the point that she said that she "is thriving".

Then it was immunisation time and she got 2 shots in her right leg and 1 in her left. She screamed and went purple again but as soon as she was put on the breast she forgot all about the pain. There was no adverse reaction so we were able to home and Genevieve then slept for 2.5 hours.... maybe we should get her immunised every day....

Taking the plunge

Today was Genevieve's first visit to the swimming pool. I hooked up with one of the mums from exercise class and we took our babies to the local Kensington community swimming pool. We looked after each others babies while we took turns at doing a few laps ourselves and then we took the kids into the toddler pool. Genevieve was clinging to me for dear life at first but then as she got used to it she was floating around on her back and tummy - with me supporting her of course. She loved it!

So I have ordered her some proper swimming pants as we think that we will make going to the pool a regular outing.

A confession...

This may not be the most appropriate forum in which to say this, but I feel I have to say it anyway. I've been sleeping with another girl.

It's only happened a few times, but when we've been lying there, with her in my arms in the weekend pre-dawn glow, it's been wonderful. Just feeling the warmth of her body. Listening to the differences in our breathing patterns. Smelling her hair.

I'm not sure if Naomi knows about us yet, although she'd have to suspect.

I'm sure it will happen again, provided I can pry her from Naomi's arms first.