3½ Years!

We didn't really have a Terrible Twos phase to speak of. Nothing that really stood out. So maybe skipping that part has made the next stage 10 times worse. The dreaded..... THREENAGER!!!

Dexter is a confident, free thinker. And now he is using that against us. His new favourite word is no! His new second home is out in the naughty corner. We've used it more in the past few months than we did in the years prior. He loves pushing the boundaries with us. But the reality is, that is the only way for him to know where the boundaries are. It's all part of one big-ass learning curve.

And whilst he is getting really good at testing our patience, he is also blossoming in lots of other really positive respects....

So, a few months ago our beautiful daughter Rayna came into our lives and Dexter was left adjusting to life with a new sister. No longer was he an only child. The baby. Now he had to grow up, learn how to share, be more patient, wait his turn. And over the last three months he has demonstrated all of the above, ten-fold! He is an awesome big brother. So caring, considerate and loving.

It's hard not to feel like sometimes he is getting brushed off or pushed to the back of the queue when it comes to getting my attention. But he gets it. He totally gets it! He doesn't make us feel bad about it or punish us for it. And he has never shown a shred of jealousy or resentment towards her. We couldn't be happier with how their bond is developing right before our very eyes.

And in-keeping with his new role as the grown up big bro, Dexter's has undergone a lot of growing up these past few months.

Dexter's room had a makeover last month. Our (not so) little giant (at 3ft 3in tall) was outgrowing his toddler bed and babyish theme in his room so it was time to upgrade to a full size single bed and a more appropriate décor...

Having a bigger bed means we get to snuggle in together at bedtime now for stories. It's my new favourite part of the day when we get to cuddle up with a couple of books and share huge hugs & kisses before sleepy time. (He's always telling me that I have to stay there and sleep with him for the night haha)

After Easter, Dexter left his old nursery at Waters Edge and moved to the nursery that is part of the primary school we hope he will be attending next year. It is more conveniently located to utilise the free hours he is entitled to and being able to go four afternoons a week means he isn't stuck at home with mama and bebe all the time. And let me tell you, he LOVES it! He settled in right from the word go, made new friends on the first day and looks forward to going every day.

Dexter is learning so much every day. He amazes us with how much he understands. He is doing so well at developing his speech. When kids say something incorrectly, if it's cute it can be easy to ignore, but we have always made a point of trying to encourage Dexter to pronounce things correctly and recently he has really been trying hard to apply this in every day conversations.

He asks a lot of questions.....

Mostly 'Why?'.....

All. The. Time.

It drives us crazy sometimes, especially when it's an infinite line of questioning. Even when things that don't have an answer to the question Why?. When things just are because they are!! But again, this is all part of his learning curve of life.

And I can't quite pinpoint when it happened, but at some point Dexter decided that it was time to phase out the mummy/daddy and start dropping in a few mum and dad's. Shane is ok with this (although he said Rayna has to call him daddy until the day he dies haha). I, on the other hand am not ready for this and keep telling him he's not allowed to call me mum, it's mummy. Most of the time he'll still call me mummy now :) haha

So yeah, our handsome devil is a little older, wiser and more responsible. He is (for the most part) such a polite, well-mannered and charming individual and we couldn't be prouder of the young man we are raising. Hopefully it means we are doing something right ;)

Becoming a big brother!

This past week, being a big brother has become reality for Dexter. We have discussed his baby sister with him loads over the past few months, but how much he understood was always a little unclear. He never questioned the fact that a baby was growing in my tummy. That she would take a long time to arrive (6 months of knowing is like a lifetime at that age). That actually at the end of it, there would be a real life little human being that would be coming home to live with us!

He was fast asleep in bed when I went into hospital to give birth. Shane was home when he woke up the next morning to give him the good news and show him a picture of her. He told Dexter that Rayna was his new baby sister and she would be coming home soon to meet him. But he had a long wait at his Nan's until we were discharged from the hospital.

Dexter has always spoke fondly of his baby sister whilst I was pregnant. He would often tell me of all the lovely things he would do as her big brother. That he would feed her, look after her, share his toys with her. But I absolutely expected a certain element of sulking when we actually introduced them....

...I was so wrong! He was so interested in her. We'd bought him a goodie-bag full of Spiderman shiz as a present from her to cushion this huge change to his current life. He loved it. He gave her a little kiss on the forehead and thanked her. My heart melted.

As the days went on, Dexter would prove to be an even better big brother than we could ever have hoped. He started to become more comfortable around her and more used to her being here. He'd constantly hold her hand or kiss her. He attentively goes over to the bouncer if she makes a noise to check she is ok or recover her blanket if it has been kicked off onto the floor.

As Rayna then started to open her eyes more and more, he was very keen on making sure that his face was one of the first she would get to know. He loves to get close to her and she seems to be mesmorised in return. A face to go with the voice she already knows so well <3 The other night we were getting Rayna ready for bed and she spent the longest amount of time to-date with her eyes open just gazing at Dexter. He held her hand and talked to her. She was so calm as we changed her for bed.

Rayna has been in the world and part of his life for a whole week now and so far the novelty has not yet worn thin. Quite the opposite, in fact. He wants to help out and be involved as much as possible.

But let me tell you, adjusting to life with two children is hard. It's taking more of an emotional toll than a physical one to be honest. Maybe other mums feel the same, maybe it's just me, I don't know but it's hard not to feel like a bad mum to your older child when you bring a new addition into the mix. Dexter has been the centre of our world for over 3 years and all of a sudden he has to share his position with someone else. He has had undivided attention from both his parents for all that time and now there is a needy new baby around that dominates that attention, taking it away from him :(

He helps out with his big brother duties but then seems that he doesn't reap some reward in return. Arranging activities to keep him busy is difficult to fit in at the moment. And spending time getting involved with said activities alongside him, even more so. My abdominal muscles separated during pregnancy so for the time being I've not been able to pick him up and cuddle him the way I did before. My stitches have made moving or sitting in certain positions virtually impossible so I have not been able to sit cuddling on his beanbag for bedtime stories. Argh! I know it's only been a week but it so hard not to feel mega guilt!!!! 

But he's been an absolute star about it all. The guilt is all my own making. He hasn't once made me feel like I'm a bad mum. I think the fact that he continues to be so happy, lively and so freaking awesome about everything is what makes me feel worse :/

But as I'm slowly starting to feel a little more human again, tonight I put my first-born baby to bed myself for the first time in over a week. He picked out two stories, climbed into bed and I sat down beside him for a cuddle. I stretched out the stories as long as I could. We talked about the pictures and laughed about this and that. When we had finished and it was time for kisses and cuddles I laid my head next to his on the pillow for a few minutes just soaking it all up. It was amazing to have a moment together, just me and him like old times.

He's done so well at being accepting of the fact that moving forward he's got to share us, so now it's more important than ever for me to show him that this doesn't mean that he get's anything less xx

The 3-Year Check

So the health visitor came round to conduct my antenatal visit today and carried out Dexter's 3-year check whilst she was here. It's pleasing to know he is on track with everything and my little fatty weighs 2 1/2 stone!!!!!! I'm amazed that at 36 weeks pregnant I can still manage to carry him :D

The health visitor couldn't say enough nice things about him and continuously commented on how calm and laid back he was and apparently he has fantastic concentration - yes, I believe that his nursery call this rigid attention... in other words, if he's focused on something, he certainly isn't listening to what you have to say haha

Christmas 2015

Christmas 2015 with Dexter was a truly awesome one! We thought that he was really into the spirit of it last year... well that was nothing compared to this year.

We took a trip to see Santa (and Dexter was absolutely thrilled that the present he got turned out to be a racing car! He'd "asked for one of those"...)

He had his first little acting role in the nativity at nursery and my little reindeer proper rocked it...

He went to bed on Christmas eve in his new reindeer jammies all excited after leaving Santa a mince pie and glass of milk to keep his energy levels up whilst delivering presents to our house.

And despite not doing the typical kid thing of getting up at the crack of dawn, he was buzzing to come into the room and see what he had got. There was so much he didn't know what to play with first, so he played with everything. All at once.

As a grown up, Christmas can be a little lacklustre but as a parent it is so fulfilling watching your child enthusiastically ripping off paper and being so enthralled with what's inside. That was definitely the best part of my Christmas this year.

And in return Dexter, brought some new things to the table for us:

• The question 'why?' - mostly to things that don't require an explanation. Always with the 'why?'  I was wondering when this stage was going to hit.
• Dry nights!!!!!! It's only been a couple of months since Dexter did a lot of growing up and not only ditched the dummy, but daytime nappies as well but this past week or so he seems to have cracked holding it all night - yippee! bye bye pull-ups

Ditching the dummy.

You only had one for bed. It had been part of your life for over 3 years. It comforted you. But you'd had it longer than we wanted you to.... to be honest, in an ideal world you'd never have had one at all. But when you were a baby and were suffering from colic it helped soothe you. At the time, it was a means to an end. After so long, we came to the conclusion that it wasn't really fair to take it away from you when you didn't understand why. So we had left it until this point. You were old enough to understand what we are telling you and agree to the decision.

Last Friday night you we very cooperative in leaving your dummies in an envelope outside the fairy door on our skirting board. We had stories as normal and you were excited to find out what the dummy fairy would leave you in return the next day.

That night, I listened to you cry yourself to sleep over the baby monitor. Literally! You made no attempts to get out of bed, you were such a good boy and really persevered. But it was hard.

The next few nights you asked for it. You said you weren't a big boy anymore and you wanted them back. We explained that they had gone now and we couldn't get them back. You accepted this and went to sleep quite quickly with no tears or fuss.

A week has gone by and you don't even bother to ask anymore. You have broken the habit. I am so proud of you.

But ditching the dummy has brought about something completely new for us all. Until that point you still napped every day. For about two hours per day. Now, no dummy seems to equal no naps. You haven't napped since we took them away. Dear god what have we done haha....

THREE TODAY!!

So my awesome boy turned three today! When I got everything out to wrap his presents I pulled the Toy Story birthday card out of the carrier bag it had been kept in since I bought it a month or so ago and felt saddened that the badge on the front of it had a big number 3 on it! It didn't seem right.

He has grown so much - both physically and mentally - this past few months:

• He has gone from being a talker to a real conversationalist. His speech and vocabulary amaze me sometimes and he talks with you now rather than at you.
• He is improving a lot of his finer motor skills and is now becoming more coordinated with his cutlery and can cut his own food with a knife and fork.
• And the biggie is we finally cracked potty training with only minimal accidents (we were beginning to think he was never going to get there!!).

In fact, his whole demeanour seems to have changed. He is still the happy, easy-going little ray of sunshine he always was - but he seems to have grown up all of a sudden. Like he is taking his impending role of big brother really seriously. He talks about his baby sister quite frequently, he likes to cuddle my bump and tell me all the things he is going to do for her or help me with when she get's here. I'm so happy he is excited about her :)

He has such an exciting morning opening presents. And this year was really exciting for us too because he really understood what the day way all about, he was really into the unwrapping of everything and showed interest in everything he got. 

He was buzzing so much with excitement that he didn't even want to nap today. So we went to meet grandma and grandad at Playworld Play Gym for some yummy dinner and to burn off some of that excess energy, then it was home to blow out the candles and have some delicious cake.

Big man has had such a good day but he is shattered now and tucked up in bed.... I can't wait to see what he will surprise us with next :)

31-33 Months

So Dexter turned 2 1/2 on 10th May 2015. The rest of that month passed by very quickly. At the end of it, I decided I needed to cut the proverbial apron strings (or at the very least loosen them) and allowed my baby boy to grow up a bit.... just a little bit.

I had managed to keep him in a cot all that time on the basis that well, there was no reason why he couldn't be in there. It was big enough to accommodate him. He had never tried of climb out of it. Why would I change anything? But recently, as woke one morning (rather late) and gazed at my son on the monitor just quietly laying awake, playing with his monkey I had a slight sense of guilt. That because he is such a content and well behaved child that he wouldn't even make noise and create a fuss to let me know he was awake and wanted to get up. That I'd had no idea how long he'd been awake and maybe he was bored and just too polite to wake me..... and that was it; my turning point. I decided that he was a big boy now and I wanted to give him the freedom to decide when he wanted to get up. Whether it be a case of he plays in his room. Or comes in to wake us up. We told him all about him being a big boy now and needing a big boy bed. He seemed very excited so off we went to Mothercare for a safety gate and a bed guard. He watched with interest as daddy dismantled his cot, removed the sides and his new bed slowly took shape.

He was super excited to get into it. He loved the idea that he could climb in and out by himself. Before Shane could even close the book of his final bedtime story he was off. Jumping in. And we never heard another peep. Not that night or any other. He sleeps just as well (and as long) as he always did and as yet he hasn't even bothered to get out of it on a morning. Maybe he wasn't bored being stuck in his cot after all and is just genuinely lazy haha

Maybe moving him into his new bed made him grow up over night. Because all of a sudden he seemed different. He looked more mature and grown up and his speech seemed to take a massive leap too. His speech has always been very good, clear and understandable. I wouldn't really say he 'learns' new words anymore as I don't think there is anything that he can't (or won't) repeat. The most significant change though is with his construction of sentences. He can get his point across so well, he can tell you about a sequence of events in order, he can sing full nursery rhymes and even make his own up and he can recite scenes from his favourite films (mostly Monsters Inc) almost word for word. It's just brilliant, we can have full blown conversations together and he understands absolutely everything that we say to him.

The biggest change for Dexter over the past 3 months though, has to be be that he has recently learned he is going to be a BIG BROTHER!!!!!! I'll be perfectly honest, when we initially broke the news we didn't exactly get the response we were hoping for :/ He was tired and cranky and was really against the idea of mummy and daddy bringing a baby home to live with us.... however, after a nap we spoke to him again and showed him our scan picture. We explained that the baby is currently living in mummy's tummy but we will soon be able to bring it home for him to play with and look after. Thankfully he seems much more into the idea now. Although he changes his mind about what he would like - at the moment he tells us he wants a sister but so far we think he might be getting a brother.... the new scan looks remarkably like Dexter did on his first scan too so we are currently under the impression we're having a boy. We're counting down being able to find out the sex thought so we can help prepare him for exactly what he can expect :) But he has since become increasingly happier about the situation. He is always telling people (and me) that there is a baby in my tummy and he will sometimes stroke my belly as he says it (it's so cute!) It's less cute when you are out in a public place though and he tries to lift your top up to show people haha

So yeah, my little man has done quite a bit of growing up recently and is no doubt going to be the model big brother come February 2016, ready to teach his new sibling everything he knows.... we can't wait xx