MSE Parents Club Part 15

SugarSpun

Weezl I read your post and wanted to respond earlier but we're on our hollybags and I don't have a lot of time. Plus we're on our hollybags from our hollybags today, VBF produced a healthy baby boy after a six-hour labour (first baby :eek:) so we're heading southwards to look at him. I do have a few minutes now though...

I probably spend 1-2 hours a day doing concentrated interacty things with the beastie - Husband probably spends about that too. I leave my computer running all the time with all my chosen internet locations open so if she's happy occupying herself for a few minutes I can get online and mess about/pay bills/order things/check banking/whatever. I spent less time interacting through play when she was smaller because I wasn't very good at it; now I find that just naming things and counting/telling her what colour they are or playing games like asking her to point to her nose/my nose/the dog in the road/whatever is enough, whereas before she needed much bigger gestures and Husband was better at playing than me.

She probably has about 2 hours of independent play as well, quite often I'll set her up doing something - like sitting playing the drums for a bit and then I'll take care of errands while she continues to bash things.

TV wise, she's in love with Ivor the Engine and gets reasonably regular 10-20 minute bursts of him, maybe 2 or 3 of those during the day.

We go to 2/3 Gymboree classes a week, which is structured play, and other than that our chosen baby date has just moved to another city so we're baby-dateless. I have vague plans to find a less structured group to take her to but I am afraid of other mummies so it might not happen

I often feel very and because other mummies seem to do a lot with their kids. But I think we all have strengths as people and these translate into strengths as parents. My grandmother, who mostly raised me, never played with me that I can remember, but she was constantly teaching me - colours, numbers, reading, counting, manners and values. So while I wonder if the lack of understanding of how playing with babies actually works is because nobody ever really played with me till I was a bit bigger and more communicative, I think she did absolutely the best she could and turned me into a person with strong moral and academic values and reasonable manners. Does that make sense? What I imagine you do with your boys is teach them to play together while teaching them your own values and the clever Weezly things you do and know about. If you don't spend four hours a day lying on the floor pretending to be a launching pad so they can leap from you to the sofa and back it doesn't matter. You are doing a better job than you think you are, a statement that is cleverly proven by your bothering to question it.

Also, :grouphug:

Becles

I'm staying at home as the roads haven't been gritted and all the roads our of our village are blocked by snow or accidents.

I went out to scrape my car and a neighbour came back. He said he left home at 7.20am, and managed to get about a mile away before giving up and coming home. He said I'd be stupid if I tried driving anywhere.

School bus never got through so the boys arrived home. Going out to play on the sledges instead :j

got-it-spend-it

Woohoo! Snow day for you Becles!

aless02

weezl, I'm going to write this from before I went back to work, as I think that'd be more helpful!

amount of time you are able to sit playing entirely with your child - prolly not as much as I should have . We more do things in 5-10 min bursts - for instance, I'll play peekaboo with him for 10 minutes or whatever and then he will get distracted and grab a toy to play with, so I take my cue and leave him to play independently. I try and do focused play sometimes, but his attention span just isn't long enough for any sort of meaningful activity (best attention span comes from sitting on my lap and looking at books). I guess I'm very a much a reactive parent, in that I will go and play with him when he cries/clings more than on my own initiative - so some days, he needs it loads more and others he will practically play by himself the whole day. But like others have said, there's SO many other times of play like when you're changing nappies (pulling silly faces and making them giggle), doing silly things at mealtimes, etc.

amount of time they do their own thing and you read mse/pay bills/read a book - far more than I should, I'm sure. For instance, if I play with him for 10-15 min, I'll then go do computer/cooking/cleaning/whatever for 30-45min after that. I tend to flow between recreation (computer, reading) and housework fairly fluidly so it's hard for me to differentiate.

amount of time you put the telly on and do stuff like cleaning/cooking/or also being on the internet - not very much but mostly because he's just not that entertained by TV yet. Sometimes it will work and distract him sufficiently, but other times it has no effect. I use TV generally as a sort of 'last resort' in that if I REALLY need to do something (especially if it's preparing his own food) and he's being super-clingy, I will attempt the TV. Very occassionally, I just use it as a break if I've had a bad day or whatever.

amount of groups you feel comfortable going to - 1x a week was library Rhyme Time. If I could afford it, I'd ideally do another day/week swimming. When the weather's nice, I might've added a session at the park once or twice a week. I'm very much a homebody and the majority of times if we go out, it is for an errand rather than an activity.

weezl, I'm hoping that it's not so much our individual replies that help you, but seeing the huge VARIETY between them that will allow your mind to forgive you a bit. My general philosophy is so long as your boys are happy and healthy, it doesn't matter too much how you go about it!

weezl74

hello, gosh! I have 6 PMs from you lovely bunch, so please bear with me on writing back, will do asap, and many many thanks for them and for the responses on here. I am really surprised and grateful for how much interest you have all taken in my question I asked last night:A. It makes me feel really cared for. Thanks

weezl74

am only on page one of all the replies you have posted and already feel like I've been wrapped in a blankie with a delicious hot chocolate

thank you parent thread

jillie1974

Glad it has made you feel better Weezl.

SusanC_2

Weezl I think in addition to my rambling yesterday, it is important to distinguish between an "ideal" day and a "satisfactory" day. My ideal day would be where I get everything done on my daily schedule. In practice I have never had an ideal day but having the schedule generally helps me to get the essentials done. A satisfactory day would be one where I manage the following:

• produce dinner myself (as opposed to OH doing it for me) (given my propensity for cooking huge amounts this doesn't require a large amount of work)
• stay up to date with the washing or make good progress at catching up
• the house is clean enough that if I tidied, vacuumed and wiped the bathroom sink I wouldn't be embarrassed to have company (this is not an incredibly high standard - we have friends with floors so dirty I don't let Alice take her shoes off because we'd have to throw her socks away)
• we haven't run out of bread (about 15 minutes work every week or two - OH cuts it for me)
• I've spent some time specifically doing something with Alice

If I surpass that and get additional things done I think of it as a good day. If I don't quite meet my criteria for satisfactory then I try to make a concerted effort to do better the following day. If I haven't felt up to doing all the things that make a satisfactory day then I usually consider that it was more important for me to have the break/rest from doing all the things than it was to do them all. Ignoring the last eleven weeks most days are satisfactory. Counting the last eleven weeks there have been whole weeks with no satisfactory days. There have even been days where the only criterion met was bread (and that was only because there was a stash in the freezer). When Alice had whooping cough I just about scraped satisfactory but not much more. I don't feel bad about not getting things done or having less than satisfactory days because I know I am doing my best and I know that when I am able to I do much more so it evens out IYSWIM.

I think it can be easy to get the idea that everyone else has good days all the time because people generally don't talk about a satisfactory or not quite satisfactory day but they do talk about the good days when they feel like they've got loads done which can inadvertently give the impression that they've got it together all the time when in fact everyone has a variety of good, satisfactory and bad days.

SusanC_2

Alice was so happy this morning when she found we had even more snow (we've got fairly similar to Becles). OH is outside with her now and she's planning to make a baby snowman, an Alice snowman, a Mummy snowman and a Daddy snowman. Which according to her adds up to six snowmen.

aless02

SusanC wrote: »

Weezl I think in addition to my rambling yesterday, it is important to distinguish between an "ideal" day and a "satisfactory" day. My ideal day would be where I get everything done on my daily schedule. In practice I have never had an ideal day but having the schedule generally helps me to get the essentials done. A satisfactory day would be one where I manage the following:

• produce dinner myself (as opposed to OH doing it for me) (given my propensity for cooking huge amounts this doesn't require a large amount of work)
• stay up to date with the washing or make good progress at catching up
• the house is clean enough that if I tidied, vacuumed and wiped the bathroom sink I wouldn't be embarrassed to have company (this is not an incredibly high standard - we have friends with floors so dirty I don't let Alice take her shoes off because we'd have to throw her socks away)
• we haven't run out of bread (about 15 minutes work every week or two - OH cuts it for me)
• I've spent some time specifically doing something with Alice

If I surpass that and get additional things done I think of it as a good day. If I don't quite meet my criteria for satisfactory then I try to make a concerted effort to do better the following day. If I haven't felt up to doing all the things that make a satisfactory day then I usually consider that it was more important for me to have the break/rest from doing all the things than it was to do them all. Ignoring the last eleven weeks most days are satisfactory. Counting the last eleven weeks there have been whole weeks with no satisfactory days. There have even been days where the only criterion met was bread (and that was only because there was a stash in the freezer). When Alice had whooping cough I just about scraped satisfactory but not much more. I don't feel bad about not getting things done or having less than satisfactory days because I know I am doing my best and I know that when I am able to I do much more so it evens out IYSWIM.

I think it can be easy to get the idea that everyone else has good days all the time because people generally don't talk about a satisfactory or not quite satisfactory day but they do talk about the good days when they feel like they've got loads done which can inadvertently give the impression that they've got it together all the time when in fact everyone has a variety of good, satisfactory and bad days.

Excellent point, Susan. My criteria are pretty much similar for 'satisfactory' - tummies full, house not a complete tip, Finn relatively happy and peaceful, enough clean nappies available, basic kitchen stocks in place. It doesn't always happen, but when I can do more, I feel good. When I can't, I try not to stress and either ask DH for help in picking up the slack, or tell myself to try and do better the next day.