Thursday, December 8, 2011

Andre



Now that Kindy's over me and the boys are languishing in the fact that we don't need to be anywhere and have stayed home for two entire days in a row. I haven't even started up the car in two days! That's good saves on petrol coz I'm broke! Ha ha.

Anakin and Andre have started each of those mornings by leaving me alone in bed to roll around as I please and have all the pillows to myself (such glory after my usual 6 or 7 hours of broken sleep squashed up between the two of them!) and heading down the orchard for a feed of berries. Except the mozzies are usually having a feed on them! And I rouse them back up to the house after 5 minutes or so.

Our excitement for the day today was a big dig through the sandpit to find half a bucket of marbles. Then they lathered up in soap and hanging on to each end of the skipping rope I dragged them repeatedly down the slip n slide. That was funny.

Oh and an electrician came to install a smoke alarm for us and fix a couple of lights. Yesterday Andre dragged a stool underneath the manhole and wanted me to lift him up there, he reckoned there was a snake in roof he wanted to see. So today when the young lad brought his ladder in and climbed up in the roof space he thought it was great! From then on all he wanted to talk about was the "guy in there". It was his favourite topic of conversation. Me and Anakin humoured him all afternoon with "Yeah, he climbed up in the ceiling hey Bub? Wonder if he saw the snake."

Andre talks so well now. I was getting a bit worried for a while because he showed no real interest in trying to talk much and then all of a sudden he just did. There was no real approximation of speech for him. It seems he just woke up one morning conversational. I'd painted my nails late the other night and when he woke up the next morning and noticed them he said "Awww beautiful! I like it!" But like Anakin when he was little - he won't say his own name. If you ask him what his name is he just says "Me". How damn cute is that but.

Andre has been a bit tough on me. God knows I so wanted this placid, sleep-loving, easy-going boy like Greg apparently was because I thought, mentally and physically that was all I was going to be able to cope with but somehow I ended up with a little hellraiser who's tested me out big time. Up until recently everything to do with him seemed like a complete struggle. Every nappy change was a battle - him kicking and scrambling away, every feed was a mental torture - he has this habit of changing sides every half a minute and won't settle down AT ALL unless he's tweaking away at my other nipple - CHRONIC! And remarkably I'm still breastfeeding him. (And it's still just as horrible!) Bedtimes were often a physical battle. Trips to the shops a nightmare. He never cared if he was in trouble so it was very hard to discipline him. I always (half) joked that it was definitely his first incarnation as a human being because his first instinct was to hit out, stamp his feet and scream his demands at you. He seemed like this little wild animal and we've really had to work at him to be smoochy and come to us for cuddles and kisses coz he just didn't care about affection at all. My other two were much more civilized as babies!! You could just tell Andre hated being a baby! He wanted to do things so bad and just fought his way through each developmental stage and always desperately onto the next. He still now always wants to do everything for himself and is so capable and determined but thankfully much happier that he can do fun stuff like tear around on a bike, climb up to where he wants to be, help in the kitchen, run like the wind... It was basically torture for him being trapped in his little baby body. And it was terrible for me thinking if he could read my mind he wouldn't even feel loved - all my internal monologues where like "keep quiet you little shit!"; "Why did I have to get you??"; "Stop being a freak!!"; "Stop SQUIRMING!!!" Sounds so terrible when I write it like that - I must have thought those things a million times! :( Anyway since he's much happier with his capabilities now and he's all done with teething which was really horrible for him and as long as I don't try stupid things like taking him grocery shopping etc it's all pretty nice. I'm still having to resettle him about 20 times a night; slipping the nipple out of his mouth and sneaking away from him as if he was a bloody newborn so I don't get that much of a break from but once he's off the boob and sleeping through I'll be rejoicing in never having to go through all that ever again!

He was two yesterday! Did I say that? And he's still a bit of a brute but we've managed to soften him up during those two years and he's my little darling as well! I love him to pieces!

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