Routine, routine, routine?
In the previous post I covered being told what to do by the little fella when it comes to bedtime. This has now extended to bottle times, both his mid-morning and and his supper.
So what do we now have to do?
MOTS had told Weekend Dad last week that there was a new routine developing with the mid-morning bottle, and suggested I observe this last weekend. It was pure genius! There's a detraction from the usual change in attitude when he sees the bottle being made, and a definite understanding of what happens next.
Until recently he has rarely told us he's hungry until he catches sight of his food, beit solids or bottle, and then all hell breaks loose. Which is why on an evening when he's getting ready for bed his supper time bottle gets put behind the curtain out of sight. Unfortunately, when he is ready he goes straight for the curtain, so he knows full well that his bottle is behind the curtain. That was only the start of it...
He takes his bottle sat on either my lap or MOTS' while we're sat on the Poang in his bedroom. I tend to start him off sat on my lap facing me, so his legs are splayed either side of my burgening gut. So when he's ready to be lifted up, the arms are raised, he gets lifted, and his legs part ready to be lowered straight into position.
But the real winner is the mid-morning bottle.
45 seconds in the ding-ding and we're ready to go. And what happens next is absolute routine now. If he's in the kitchen when the bottle goes in the microwave, he'll take a very quick look inside, see his bottle, then charge out of the kitchen. Hang on, that isn't the boy we know, he used to see his food and go wild, right? Sowhere on earth has he gone? From the kitchen, thud thud thud through the hall as he runs off, bang goes the lounge door as it bounces off my plasterboard. And there he is, stood at the chair in the lounge waiting for one of us to sit down so he can climb up, sit, and have his bottle.
Of course the routine is all well and good, but the one-offs are really nice too. Last weekend we were getting ready to go out, myself and MOTS sat together on the foot of the stairs to put our shoes on. The little fella came over, forcing a gap between our legs, and ending up sitting on the step below us. And again the next day, the difference being that MOTS didn't well up as much the second time around.
So easy...
