Happy Birthday Nipper!

Happy Birthday Nipper!

Our New Arrival

Here is our new arrival - only 30 seconds old! (Apologies to anyone who is squeamish!)

As you can see he was born by c-section despite me nearly having a nervous breakdown at the thought (several hypnotherapy sessions worked wonders!) He weighed 8lbs and 7ozs and was born at 12:44pm as we were last on the theatre list.

The whole experience seems somewhat surreal to me now that we are back home. It wasn't as 'bad' as I'd expected though they did give me too much anaesthetic and the block went right up to my upper chest and I could feel my chin and ears going numb - scary! We only spent two nights in hospital. That doesn't seem very long, does it? I was in for longer with both Miss Muffett and Nipper. My stitches came out on Wednesday and though the area is very sore I'm managing to get about and do a few things around the house. All in all, a pretty good birth experience, and much better than the previous two.

'New Nipper', as I kept calling him, will be known in Blogland as 'Tiddler' (Kitty referred to him as Tiddler and I really liked it).

Here he is looking a bit more civilised:

He's quite a quiet baby, more noticeable I think because the other two were real screamers. He likes nothing more than a good feed followed by a good kip with my boob still in his mouth! Miss Muffett thinks he's quite cute and Nipper has taken his arrival reasonably well though he seems a bit cross with me. Not so cross as to deny me the lovely bunch of flowers that he made for me at nursery though:

Fingers crossed that the quiet times continue!

Our New Arrival

A Labour of Love

No, not that kind of 'labour'. New nipper is still tucked up inside and we will be setting off for the hospital at 7am tomorrow morning. By lunch time he should be with us!

No, this labour has been the knitting of a crib blanket:

Each row took approximately 5 minutes to knit and I ended up with around 180 rows (kept knitting till the yarn ran out). Altogether that's about 15 hours though it felt like much longer!

Soule Mama knitted a lovely blanket for her new baby and she mentioned that it was a variation of a 'feather and fan' pattern. So I looked up what this pattern was and it seemed pretty simple so I figured I'd give it a go. There's no actual pattern to follow, rather just a stitch and row repeat (18 stitches repeated over the row with 4 rows making up the pattern with a few extra stitches at the beginning and end of the row to form a border). Another 'winging it' project for me - lol! Here's a close-up, believe me when I say that it's much easier to knit than it looks:

I have some nice cotton yarn but was worried about making a mess of the project and wasting it so decided to use some baby acrylic double knit that I had in my crafty cupboard. I didn't have a clue how many stitches to cast on in order to get a blanket of the right size so I did a trial run of the pattern stitch and row repeat and hazarded a guess. My finished blanket is the perfect size for a moses basket. I'm really pleased with how it turned out and now wish that I'd made it big enough for a cot and out of the cotton after all!

In case anyone's interested here's my 'recipe':

2x 100g balls baby acrylic double knit.

1 pair of size 4.5mm needles (as I wanted it to knit up fairly quickly).

Cast on 116 stitches (6 x 18 for the pattern repeat plus 4 stitches at the beginning and end of each row to form a border).

Knit the first 4 rows to form a border.

Start the pattern repeat:

Row 1: Knit

Row 2: Knit 4, Purl to the last 4 stitches, knit 4.

Row 3: Knit 4, *knit 2 together x three times, yarn forward then knit 1 x six times, knit 2 together x three times*, repeat from * to * to the last 4 stitches, knit 4.

Row 4: Knit.

Do as many 4 row repeats as you like but ending with a row 4 (I did 42 repeats).

Knit the last 4 rows to form a border.

Cast off.

If I was going to do this again I would probably knit 6 or 8 rows for the top and bottom borders, and likewise 6 or 8 stitches at the beginning and end of each row for the side borders.

Pregnancy Update:

Well, tommorrow is the big day and I'm pretty nervous. I'll be away from blogland for a little while I think but will try to pop up a picture of the new arrival. Thank you for all your good wishes, I will be thinking of them all!

A Labour of Love

Things I Probably Shouldn't Be Doing At 38 Weeks Pregnant!

1). Building shelving systems:

Though it's so good to have the toys going 'up' the wall instead of across the floor (Mr Earplugs did help) and we can now find what we want to play with.

2). Yanking all the ivy off the garden wall. We've been trying to keep the ivy in check but it's a constant struggle and it's getting into the borders and the lawn, not to mention growing about 8 foot high in places, and ruining the pointing:

So, it had to go:

Now we have a lovely ivy free wall which we can repair:

And a space to put a small shed (we have a shed already but it's too big and rotten in places so that'll be going soon too!):


3). Spending a couple of hours traipsing around Heathrow looking for the 'spectators area' which is signposted but doesn't actually exist anymore! I had a few choice words to say about that! We were able to watch some planes taking off by hanging around the car-park (which you're not supposed to do apparently??). We also found a spot outside of the perimeter fence where you can watch the planes coming into land. They are so low at this point that you feel as if you could reach out and touch them. It was quite an experience and Nipper loved it. Wish I'd taken the camera!

4). Clambering around with Nipper on the equipment here with a view to getting him a play-frame (not from here though as they are a bit pricey). Mr Earplug's Grandad left him a bit of money when he died recently and we know he would love the idea of a play-frame for the kids. Unfortunately we have a slightly stroppy neighbour who I'm sure will make a complaint about it. I tried to head this off by asking the local Council's advice but they were useless. There isn't any legislation that specifically covers kiddies play equipment so they wouldn't give me any advice. So we'll have to put it up and see what happens and possibly apply for planning permission! I ask you - planning permission for a play-frame!

Following the ivy yanking and the kitchen refurb we're left with this:

So from now until the 12th we'll be skip-filling (got one coming tomorrow).

Pregnancy Update:

Well, so much for me saying I'm going to take it easy. We've had far too much to do! I think the iron tablets must be giving me a new lease of life - lol! Having said that, I'm quite tired as I can't find a comfortable sleeping position. I'm also having severe braxton hicks. I only had mild contractions for a few days before Nipper was born and none at all before Miss Muffett came along. These are so painful that I have to practice a bit of deep breathing! Hope that doesn't mean that new Nipper is coming early! I'll be having an afternoon at the hospital later this week for a 'pre-op' visit and a trip to the path lab next week for blood samples to be held in case something goes wrong - don't like the sound of that!

Re the registrar telling us we couldn't have skin-to-skin contact - I went to a 'c-section class' and was able to talk to a theatre midwife who said that it will be possible. We just have to tell the midwife and anaesthetist on the day and they will make it possible. I figured that might be the case. Shame that the 'higher-ups' who are often giving you information don't actually know the reality! Isn't that often the way though?!

And finally, something which I did, but which probably should have been done a few weeks ago really - set up a 'baby station' in our bedroom:

My lovely (if somewhat dated) gliding rocker came from Ebay for just £24 and a trip by Mr Earplugs to collect it. I also washed the moses basket:

So if new Nipper comes early I think we might just be ready for him - aside from the fact that we'll have to wait about an hour for m-i-l to get here!

Things I Probably Shouldn't Be Doing At 38 Weeks Pregnant!