Finn loses a tooth

With Sharon down at Leadership Conference in London over the weekend I had a fun few days trying to co-ordinate pick-ups and drop-offs whilst also going into work. I did take Wednesday afternoon off and had a good play with Angus in the back garden, kicking a ball about and trying to avoid squishing the rotten apples that finally appeared from beneath the snow drifts. It was good to see the afternoon just a little lighter than the depths of midwinter, offering hope that spring may soon be in the air.

Such thoughts were quickly dispelled by the biting winds of the last few days. I elected to do as little as possible with the boys as they were fairly busy with cubs, skiing, trampolining, nursery and school, and seemed content to stay in and be fed winter favourites such as fish pie, burgers and sausage pasta. On Saturday evening though, a melon provided the death knell for one of Finn's shaky teeth, a lower incisor. There was a fraught half hour in which the poor lad was clearly distraught, having never suffered a tooth loss before. He didn't want to touch it with either finger or tongue and was drooling bloody saliva into a paper towel before I persuaded him to gently manipulate it to finally separate it from his gum.

Sharon returned after the boys were in bed, having had a very hard working few days in London. The Tooth Fairy duly visited Finn in the night, to the tune of £2. I'm not sure what he's done with the money.

On Sunday we had a rare family day, Sharon having been hither and tither this month. She bought the boys some music CDs. Sean is really into his pop now, so a Katy Perry CD and Now (That's What I Call Music) 77 was much appreciated. I can remember the first Now... album in 84/85. I was in my first year at Uni and my landing mate Dougie Adamson played it to death. Freedom from Wham! got plenty needle time. So we had a family disco in jammies on Sunday morning before embarking on a trip to the barbers for all four boys, Angus included. he behaved very well, sitting on my lap, and didn't seem the least bit bothered at the trimmer being used to tidy up his "sideys!" Credit to the barbers in Morningside: there's a few who wouldn't have looked favourably on us descending en masse.

After that we went to Two Thin Laddies at Tollcross for lunch. They're doing a good line in gluten-free food now and I enjoyed the all day cooked breakfast with GF sausages and Genius bread toasted. It's a long time since I've tucked into that when I've been out! It was good to spend some family time together after all the shuttling back and forward of the last few weeks.

Jump start January

A New Year and a fresh start at work. I've survived the latest round of redundancies, the enterprise architecture team being viewed as providing a key function in the company's quest to realise strategic goals. But the Group Technology Direction department of which EA was a part has been disbanded and the manager made redundant. We're anticipating a new Chief Architect to lead us in March so we have another period of uncertainty to cover until then. It's increasingly apparent I work for a plc rather than an old-fasioned mutual insurer.

The Lasts popped in last Sunday. It was good to see them and prompted Finn, as ever, into much silliness with Morven, sticking coloured spotty stickers all over his face as "chickenpox." Needless to say I was picking them off carpets, slippers and clothes for the following few days.

Sharon has been getting back into running and Paul was trying to persuade her to target the Grangemouth 10k early in the year. In an effort to join Sharon in her quest for fitness (she had a good 2010 with her personal trainer and is keen to maintain and improve on that in 2011), I have embarked on the KettleWorx course of Core, Cardio and Resistance training using a KettleBell weight. I have reached the point where my appreciation of the need to get fitter has overcome my loathing of doing organised exercise. I doubt you'll see me in a gym (ever!) but I'm prepared to do the three times a week, 25 minute KettleWorx workouts as they seem to target the areas I really need to improve on, especially to offset the detrimental effects of coeliac disease and asthma.

The boys seem to have had an extra long Christmas break. I took Finn and Rowan for a swim on Tuesday, my last day off, and Sean has had a couple of days round at friends' houses, but the Christmas present pile has been well worked down. Sean has had fun with his electronics set which is much more plug and play than the one I had as a boy. That one required wires to connect spring terminals with a much more physical view of the resistors, capacitors and transistors. Bad memories of my second year Uni Electrionics module!

Angus is off the bottle. He was perfectly content with it before bedtime, much longer than the others it seems, but that was probably due to us not breaking the habit. So we're breaking it now. His bottom two molars have erupted so we expect him to be ploughing into raw steak soon.

Sharon hosted a reward dinner on Saturday night which went on into the small hours of Sunday morning. Fortunately I had the ear plugs in! The snow returned this weekend with a hard frost but it didn't prevent Hannah and I having a brisk Sunday morning walk up to Swanston village which looked very picturesque in the wintry landscape. Sharon and I then enjoyed a rare lazy afternoon, the boys playing amongst themselves (which they do very well when the mood takes them) while we watched a couple of films on the telly and cuddled up on the couch.

Stepping up

Angus is now walking! He took a few steps on Tuesday for Linda and then Sharon and I had him walking (well, taking a step or two then lunging) between us in the kitchen. By Wednesday he was dancing with his brothers in the sitting room and drenched with sweat at his efforts! That boy knows how to sweat. Since then he's been standing up without the aid of support, tottering hither and thither and regaining his balance when he looks like tipping over. Today he managed to walk from the front door all the way into the sitting room and was mightily pleased with himself. He is currently sporting a couple of livid line bruises, one on his cheek and on on his leg, where he has toppled over against the console unit. Like his brothers, he'll just have to master the art of the toddle and make sure his face plants are on soft ground.

It's not all been good news though. His fifth tooth has cut through and his nappies over the last week have been dreadful. His bottom is all sores and scabs and he hasn't been sleeping very well. Sharon had a tough night with him on Wednesday, barely getting any sleep before her early start to fly down to Birmingham for the PC conference. Angus doesn't seem bothered by his sore bottom during the day, other than when he is being changed. His appetite is certainly undiminished. He can easily put away as much as Rowan, and generally more quietly.

Angus the Intrepid

As Angus ticks off the last month of the calendar, we're reailsing our last little boy is speeding his way out of babyhood. In Mallorca he was starting to cruise the furniture with some success, having also adopted a more traditional crawling style compared to his former commando crawl / butterfly stroke, probably as a result of the tiled floors being a bit cold on his tummy.

On return home he renewed his efforts to achieve his goal of climbing the stairs. We would hear him making his way along the hall carpet then there would be a series of grunts and slides then we would be alerted by one of his brothers that "Angus is on the stairs again!" On insepction, he would be several stairs up, offering a cheeky satisfied smile through the spindles. Eventually, when no-one was looking, he got all the way to the top, a feat repeated a number of times since, usually under supervision.

Yesterday, I went into the attic to unearth the stair-gate we used to bar Rowan's access to the stairs at a similar age. Angus's disappointment at the stairs being off-limits was more than offset by the appearance of a number of new toys, a V-Tech walker amongst them. He promptly staggered the length of the hall without too much bother, having the weight (now two stones) to push down on the walker as well as the balance to maintain a forward momentum with his chubby little legs. He was delighted with himself!

Angus continues to enjoy his grub and is starting to share some of the meals that his brothers have, sometimes eating better than them. His ability at picking up finger food is very good although he's got to the "throw things on the floor for attention" stage which seems to be where most of his bread and toast is ending up. He's still not really cracked drinking from a beaker and showed a little promise in sucking a straw on holiday but I'm sure he'll figure out feeding himself soon enough. The first of his two top teeth has broken through and the dreadful teething nappies of the last few weeks have thankfully abated. Some things about babyhood you will not miss!

Two down, eighteen to go

Sean's front tooth finally fell out in the early hours of Friday morning. He felt the need to come down and share this momentous event with us, which was nice, although I would probably have preferred to sleep at that point. The tooth fairy generously swapped the tooth for £2 on the Friday night but, given that Sean's second front tooth came out on Sunday (it was looking the worse for wear after Sean had been giving it a good tug at Phoebe's bowling party and had migrated to the centre of his upper gum), requiring another £2 "investment" from the tooth fairy, I think said fairy may need to revise its lending strategy in these uncertain economic times. A quick calculation suggests 4 children x 20 teeth @ £2 equals a dental outlay of £160. Quite probably a sliding scale will need to be put into operation.

Meanwhile, Sean is lishping a little and generally looking a bit odd. Just another sign that our biggest boy is growing up before our eyes.

The boys were made up over the weekend as they had a constant companion in Clodagh who was over here with Bernie on a mission to look after Sharon in her hours of need. Sharon and Bernie looked out the remaining baby clothes and car seat as we count down towards the arrival. On the Sunday I took Clodagh and the boys for a hike around Bonaly "Crunchy" Park. It was harder work than I anticipated as Rowan was in one of his post-nap strops that would not let up and had to be hauled, cajoled and carried up steep inclines and through forests. Sean was grumpy to start with too but soon got into the climbing and him and Finn had their usual great time playing in forests.

Walk the walk, Rowan!

I was out walking with Lesley (or Leh Leeeee as Ro was shouting) this morning, we decided to head off soon after school drop off and see how Rowan lasted in the buggy. I had water, tub of raisins and O's, emergency rice cakes and a couple of books for the Main Man. He was just brilliant, couldn't have been better! We did 6 miles, just under 2hours. He ate everything I brought, bar a few rice cake crumbs!

It was fairly windy while we were out, so when we arrived back home, there was definitely a touch of the Farah Fawcett-Majors about Rowan, with the "flicks" in the hair! He looked so funny! After all he had eaten, I thought he wouldn't eat much lunch - wrong! He scoffed a boiled egg (no yolk!), a corned beef sandwich, three little leftover biscuits and a banana. It is good to see him back eating well again. Lets hope his good mood and huge appetite we have seen over the last couple of days is the turning point. The last month has been hard with the interrupted sleep, teething, poor appetite, nappies that would make you faint and the wee man's general feeling of unwellness.