Alder's Tone

Yup it is now 37 weeks since Sarah and I had one too many wines on a warm summers night. 37 weeks on Saturday past to be precise. Time goes by extremely quickly when you are waiting around and counting down the days. I have no idea how to sum up what the past month or two have been like as quite simply they have been a blur..

We have been to classes to learn what to do when Sarah is in labour, how I can support her, pain relief, had a tour of the ward, been told about health visitors, mid wives, the role of grand parents, how to change a nappy, how to bath a baby, what to buy, what not to buy, I've built cribs, cots, drawers, toy boxes, painted rooms, put up curtains, ordered carpets (one for the nursery, one for the bedroom while we are at it...sigh), bought bedding (sounds like a hamster), night lights and learned how to put up and take down the pram/buggy etc etc. I am out of breath writing it.

When Lee asked me to write on this site I had a vision of devoting a Saturday morning to it with a nice cup of tea and relaxing. Not a chance. When I dont have anything to do I get this unerring feeling that I SHOULD be doing something to prepare. Put simply I am on edge, hyper and the adrenalin is pumping.

Its like Christmas Eve without knowing when Christmas is actually going to be - oh, and added to that you have NO IDEA what you are going to be doing on Boxing Day. It certainly wont be sleeping as per usual.

Lee occasionally meets me for lunch and we have an hour in the canteen. It goes like this: Lee "So hows things with Sarah?". Me: "blah blah blah". Then we walk back via my desk after an hour and I say "Oh, and how are you by the way?". I know I am doing it but if someone mentions baby its like releasing a valve.

I have no idea whether I will post again before Junior arrives but I will certainly put a final post on here (before handing it back over fully to Lee - ta mate!) letting you know whether its a boy or girl, name etc. Cheers!

Posted by ChrisGent at 27 February 2007 | Permalink | Comments (2)

If you've come here because you've received an email from some random address @alderstone.co.uk and want to stick it to me for sending you SPAM, rest assured you've got the wrong guy.

Fritters, anyone?Spammers frequently use domains not belonging to them to form the reply-to and from addresses in an email, and it's a common problem. One that won't be sorted out unless we have a concencus on authenticated SMTP, which itself has many pitfalls. So, please, if you have received an email trying to sell you anything from Viagra to body part extensions allegedly from some-random-address @alderstone.co.uk, IT AINT ME.

Bill Thompson of the BBC has been hit by this and writes a good article on the problem.

So, for anyone here looking for the annoying little bar steward who's filling their inbox, sorry but you've hit the first hurdle in the wild goose chase and come to the wrong place. If you're keen on trying to find where the email really came from is to look at the headrers and tracing the IP address of the source. Know what some of the headers are, but not others? Take a look at http://www.stopspam.org/email/headers.html

Posted by Lee at 27 February 2007 | Permalink | Comments (1)

Another blacklisted company, for advertising one price on their website and charging higher, And a company with a second mention on the blog, having not refunded a return that was made in accordance with the Distance Selling Regulations 2000.

Baby Curls
Early February MOTS ordered two new Grobags for Junior, one of which was (and still is) advertised at £21.50. Yet when the charge is raised and the bill comes in, it's £23.50.

Two emails to them, one ignored the other came back with "there's an error on the website". £2 won't make us any richer or poorer, but it's false advertising, it's against the law, and they obviously don't care about customer retention or rectifying known issues with pricing.

Boots
MOTS ordered a portable high chair from Boots, the fabric kind that sits on any standard chair, folds up into a neat little bag and can be popped into a changing bag for complete portability. Only it was cheap rubbish, so under the Distance Selling regulations it went back and we bought a better one. So far no refund.

Two suggestions, folks:
1) Charge the advertised price
2) Honour your legal obligations

Both are being chased.

Posted by Lee at 27 February 2007 | Permalink | Comments (4)

Here it is, the interim appraisal. Common in the workplace, also known as the "6 month review".

Is it that time already? But we haven't even got our objectives set yet!!!!!

So here's the ratings:

Sleep - 10/10
Since around the 6 weeks marker we've been getting near to adult sleeping patterns. And for us that means very different things. I'm used to being up by around 8 on a weekend and MOTS is more like her dad who tends to rise a little later, Monday if he could get away with it. Perfect score now, and has been for a long time.

Weight - 9/10
He's strayed from the 50th percentile, but has remained static above it. We thought he was perfectly textbook until this happened. I just know that tub of Ben & Jerry's was a mistake.

Input - 8/10
Feeding has been a bit of a challenge, particularly in the early days when MOTS was trying to do her best while at the same time trying to explain to midwives that 0.3ml of colostrum just isn't going to satisfy even the least hungry of babies. Mum 1, midwives nil.

Output - 7/10
To be fair, nobody said this was the easy part. Poor rating here given the absolute carnage that was last weekend.

Love - 10/10
Unconditional. And that's both ways. There's no greater sight than the boy laying eyes on his daddy and reacting in ways only a dad could appreciate. The utter excitement, the flailing arms, the kicking legs, and the beaming smile accompanied with the screeching sound of an early "good evening, father, hope your day was well" make this the best. And it's always good for making the missus cry with happiness at the sight of all this love going on.

Maths - 0/10
Martin's post on matching numbers brings it all home. As humans we like "special" numbers. Like how many people try to buy a registration plate with 666 on it? Or try and have their baby born on 01/01? Or even the upcoming 8/8/8 next year (keep it in your pants a while yet if that's the date you're aiming for). We've had nothing in the way of these funny numbers, or rather not taken any notice of any. Until I pointed out this morning, that at 26 weeks old today, the boy is 10% of the way to starting school, given he'll start almost exactly on his 5th birthday. MOTS wasn't too keen on this, maybe because for the entire period from her turning 26 to turning 28 I constantly reminded her that she's nearly 90% of the way to being 30, 90% of the way there, over 90% there. Well, the boy only has 90% of the way to go before he starts school. Quick, down to WHSmith to get his books and pencils sorted!

PE - 9/10
We're not quite to Olympic standards just yet, and with only 5 years to go it's looking doubtful this time around. But athletics does seem to be a favourite at the moment. The boy has shown a keen interest in football from an early age (season ticket holder for the local club aged 3 weeks, thinks his dad is Lineker, Hanson or Shearer), progressing now to playing. Showing an interest in bouncing too, he can take own weight on his legs for a few seconds at a time with help no more than to offer a bit of balance.

Transport - 0/10
The pram is no longer. Granny bought her grandson a Silver Cross all singing all dancing Sleepover Classic but it's had its day. This weekend it was offically converted from the pram into the pushchair. The boy loves it, the wife on the other hand, wasn't too keen on the idea of her little baby not being such a little baby any longer. If only we still had the hormonal cry chart going. The hardware scores 10/10, but I must mark Junior's progress and the effect on us, so as he made his mum cry it's a big fat zero.

Economics - 12/10
Just to make it clear that economics and budgets go out of the window...

Cost per dribble?

Summary of achievements
What a six months. It's been bloody hard work, and there are times when we wonder why we did it. Well I don't but I feel I must put "we" for the benefit of self defence. But then we get one good minute in an otherwise nasty day and the answer is usually smiling us in the face.

Here's looking forward to the first birthday (What did Berkmann say about that....?)

Posted by Lee at 20 February 2007 | Permalink | Comments (1)

In an early post I briefly mentioned that in Berkmann's book "Fatherhood: The Truth" a brief chapter covered "Piss, Shit & Vomit". I also added, with a sense of expectation, that it was possible that the ratio of chapter:book was not in fact related to the book:reality ratio. How correct I was.

In Baby's first...solids I did say there were two ends of the solids conversation, and as the entry level has been covered now is the time to tie in this and Berkmann's chapter. Yes, it's the big exit.

Unlike in Eastenders when the big exit is in the back of a black cab, the big exit this weekend was out of an ill-fitted nappy. For that one we'll blame MOTS given she'd applied said nappy and cunningly left the house to go shopping, obviously well aware of the impending carnage.

Part way through Saturday morning it was discovered that a nappy change was required. And oh boy, was it required. Out of the side of the nappy, down the left leg, in amongst the toes. Thankfully the sleepsuit acted like something from NASA, containing everything therein. It was disgusting, and the smell (how can carrot smell so bad?). Oh my god, the SMELL.

Delicate removal of the sleepsuit was required, as was the vest - this was covered too and had to come off over the head. A head that was the destination for all things grabbable by hand, given eveyrthing goes in the mouth at the moment. So it was tricky to say the least. Leg still covered, keeping them down to keep Junior from grabbing his feet (and trying to chew them). Under control - just. Shit everywhere.

Half a dozen wipes later and we can almost see some bare leg again, but still needing a LOT of attention. Then came the piss. All over me it went, hand over to stop the flow, but it may have well been a leaking pipe in the Thames Water area, it just didn't stop flowing. So that needed a mop-up, all the while still holding feet down to prevent shitty feet being chewed. Totally fed up and about to cry.

A short struggle later and I had cleaned up enough to relocate to a freshly waiting clean vest and clothes. There's light at the end of the tunnel.

So what's missing? Ahh, the vomit. No sooner had I managed to get his vest on he puked, and puked well.

So there we go, in the wrong order but all three elements present and in volume.

MOTS made her appearance at exactly the right moment, just as I was tipped over the edge and about to give the clothes a cuddle and shove the baby in the washing machine. Thanks, darling!

Just one question: How can something change the composition of milk, fruit and vegetables into that?

Posted by Lee at 12 February 2007 | Permalink | Comments (0)

An unashamed plug, nothing to do with the normal topics of the blog, but dear to the family nonetheless.

MOTS is doing the Race for Life this year, so has set up online sponsorship. Not bad considering she wasn't going to get sponsorship at all, but I persuaded her as every little helps. Please excuse the use of a corporate tagline of one of the main event sponsors.

To help MOTS raise money for Cancer Reaserch UK, please donate here.

Posted by Lee at 10 February 2007 | Permalink | Comments (2)