Things That Make Me Smile No. 12: Miss Chief's 3rd Birthday and Favourite Toys

It was Miss Chief's 3rd birthday yesterday. I found many things to smile about throughout the day despite having two children who wouldn't sleep (I didn't even try with the Chief but felt like I spent most of the day in the Bairn's room trying to coerce him into sleep); and despite having been up until midnight the night before (frosting heart-shaped cakes that no one ate, that I'd made in addition to the HUGE main cake because I was so convinced it wasn't going to be big enough to go around; even though we were having a small mid-week morning tea with only about 7 of Miss Chief's friends and their mothers; and in the end we still have half the main cake left and all of the heart-shaped mini cakes, which have been bundled off to daycare with the Chief in the hope that they can make them go around the 17 or so kids they'll have there today).

So here are a few of those things that made me smile:

• I asked Miss Chief, who'd been opening presents all day and had the most amazing birthday cake (if I do say so myself) that she'd helped to choose, what her favourite part of the day was and she answered "playing with my friends". I asked her this question a few times and got a different answer each time but this was my favourite one.



Amazing cake

• The big smile on the Chief's face when we all sang Happy Birthday to her.

• The fact that the Wee Bairn, having only had two 20 minute naps throughout the day, remained happy, smiley and social. What an amazing child he is.
• That the kids are now at an age where they can play together for hours with minimal interruptions to us mums and few tantrums, tears and fights.
• Eddie supposedly filling up the pool but actually watering everything else in sight, including the table where all the mums and babies were sitting. For context, I should mention that Eddie is Miss Chief's peer and is turning 3 next week. We also have an adult friend called Eddie. I'm not sure whether it would be funnier or more annoying had it been grown-up Eddie doing it.
• Chief wearing her new (reversible) Disney Princess dress (Aurora a.k.a Sleeping Beauty on one side, Belle - Chief's favourite - on the other) and Belle tiara. She is such a girl. Funny how that happens. I remember my sister-in-law saying she believes that you're either born a tomboy or a girly girl and that upbringing has little effect - I'm assuming so long as you're a parent that neither encourages nor discourages either behaviour. I'm inclined to believe that she's right about that, although Chief is heavily influenced by her girly big cousins. And she likes trains and cars too and is physical and boisterous like a boy. The theme of this birthday was definitely princesses and fairies though.



Chief in her Belle dress and tiara - taken with her new Princess camera that can add fun borders

• The fact that I totally managed to save a cake with a huge hole in it by filling it with a chocolate sour cream ganache (because we only had sour cream in the house and thank god! Other Half had returned home from shopping with a rare block of chocolate for me). It didn't even look like it wasn't supposed to be like that. Genius.

• Chief fell asleep on our bed last night and as Toby carried her off to her own room I looked at my now big 3 year old and how tiny she looked in his arms and thought "ah! She's still little, really. "What a relief.

And now for my absolute favourite moment of the whole day. Chief had had some wonderful presents which she'd spent the whole day playing with happily. I'd felt bad to have spent so much time with the Bairn trying to get him to sleep but she didn't really seem to mind. She played with her Barbies, looked at her new books, stuck some stickers and cuddled her gorgeous new Mary Poppins doll (thank you Nana Joan and Dekka) but at the end of the day, as I was getting the Bairn ready for bed, which were the two toys she brought into his room to play with? Frazzle and Dorothy, a sock toy I made for her first Christmas, and the giraffe I made for her last year. Priceless!

Dorothy and Frazzle chilling together.

(Update: Just had a funny thought that made me giggle. Chief doesn't have a middle name, making her initials PC, somewhat appropriate for the daughter of two I.T. professionals. I just thought that we could have given her a middle name of Valentina, considering when she was born. It has a really nice ring to it, except her initials would be PVC!)

Sewing Project No. 5: Dorothy the Giraffe

This is another Melly & Me Mrs Perkins toy giraffe.

Phoebe saw me making Asher's giraffe about 6 months ago and kept asking if it was for her. So I took her shopping to a rather nice fabric shop so she could pick out the fabric for her own. Although I love Ash's giraffe I felt limited in having to go for gender-neutral fabrics. I was so excited about doing something girly as there really are some beautiful fabrics out there. But Phoebe fixated on the pinkest one she could find, a plain pink fabric with white spots. I tried to turn her attention to some beautiful floral and cupcake fabrics, prints with owls and others with cats or butterflies. But it was no use. She'd decided. And by then she was getting a bit too antsy for a nice quiet quilting shop. I chose the complimentary green fabric. If it was up to Phoebe the hooves would have been a plain pink.

Mrs Perkins No. 2 was originally named Gerry. Phoebe then decided that Dorothy the Dinosaur was a much better name. I persuaded her to drop the dinosaur bit.

Dorothy and Mrs Perkins are quite good friends and like to hang out and chat every now and then. I think Pinky and Perky would be quite good nicknames for them. Dorothy somehow ended up slightly bigger in the body than Mrs P. I think I must have misread the pattern notes. I felt like I rushed her a bit resulting in a bit of a square nose, misaligned hooves and more stuffing than the original. But she's really grown on me and the over-stuffing has resulted in a much sturdier toy. Phoebe loves her and takes her to bed with her every night. And that's the main thing. And I'm happy to say that Asher loves Mrs P too and particularly likes to chew her antlers. Which should put my sewing abilities to the test.

Sewing Project No. 3: Mrs Perkins the Giraffe

This is another gorgeous Melly & Me design, only this time, being the by-now experienced sewer that I am, I jumped straight in with the posh fabrics. I made this for our baby and as we don't yet know if it's a boy or a girl I chose some nice bright, gender-neutral colours.

I just love this. The horns and ears were a bit tricky to turn inside out and the horns were a total pain to stuff but that aside I had a lot of fun making it and it didn't really take too long. I just did a bit here and there. I got the fabrics from The Quilter's Angel in Highfields and also managed to get some good quality Birch toy fill there. It makes such a difference having decent stuffing. A couple of people have now suggested using old pillows so I might try that next time, although hopefully Quilter's Angel will get a bag of the proper stuff in for me in time for my mother-in-law to pick it up before she heads this way next weekend.

Sewing Project: Phoebe the Test Elephant

Meet Phoebe, the cute little Melly & Me elephant that started my sewing craze. I first met Phoebe back in August last year when we visited the in-laws in Highfields, near Toowoomba. My Mam and I wandered into a beautiful little patchwork shop called The Quilters Angel. The Melly & Me dinosaur, Dilbert caught my attention first but when Mam pointed out an elephant called Phoebe I just couldn't resist. I spent ages picking out fabrics for her.

I asked the lady at the counter if I'd need a sewing machine and she said it was advisable so I could get small enough stitches to keep the stuffing in. I didn't have one but my mother-in-law came to the rescue and loaned me hers. After a quick lesson in how to use it she suggested I make linings for the curtains I was having made. And the rest, as they say, is history.

Well, sort of. I started making a test Phoebe with fabric left over from the quilt we made at my baby shower. Then work got busy, my mother-in-law reclaimed her sewing machine (by which time I'd finished the curtain lining) and poor Phoebe sat earless for quite a while. The ears were to be hand-stitched anyway so I eventually got them done over Christmas. Then all that was left was the blanket, for which I needed a machine.

Then I bought a machine but got very excited about all the other things I could do and it was a further three months before Phoebe finally got her blanket. I finished her yesterday and presented her to the real Phoebe, who said "Wow, Mammy."

Here's a photo of them together.

So now I can get on with the proper Phoebe using the posh fabrics. But first I have to make a Mrs Perkins for the baby and then I have to acquire some decent toy fill - the stuff from Spotlight is rubbish. It goes all lumpy. But the Quilter's Angel are going to call me when they get some in and mother-in-law will pick it up for me. It might get finished within a year of buying the materials. Then again...

Tidy up

Conversation between me and Toby the other day amidst a lounge full of scattered toys.

Me: We're gonna have to start teaching Phoebe to tidy up after herself.
Toby: Yes! This has gone on for too long.

Cracked me up.

Theory of Mind

Amelie came around to play today.

We haven't seen her for a few weeks. Last time she visited she zipped around the house using Phoebe's ride-on car as a walker. Lucie followed excitedly exclaiming it was the furthest Amelie had walked. Now it's her favourite thing and she's pretty adept at it although she's yet to take her first solo steps.

Phoebe and Amelie are developing a lovely friendship. At lunch they wave at each other from across the table and end the meal by yelling loudly together. Admittedly today it did seem to be Phoebe doing all of the yelling. She was apparently very excited about having her little friend come to visit.

After lunch they had a play.

Lucie sat Amelie in the ball pool. She wasn't too sure about it. Phoebe loves the ball pool. It's one of those sandpit clams that you can put sand in one half and water in the other. She likes to throw balls from one half to the other then climb into the other side and throw them back. Then she climbs back to the first side and rolls around. Eventually she lays back abd body surfs the balls which end up spilling out and rolling all over the floor.

Phoebe was obviously thrilled to have a friend to play with in the pool and climbed in to join Amelie. But as the balls started to move around Amelie freaked out and started to cry. Phoebe stopped and watched Amelie closely. She seemed acutely aware that her movements in the pool were upsetting her.

Later, Amelie practised her walking with the ride-on car. Again, Phoebe got very excited at the opportunity to share her toys with a friend. How I hope this behaviour continues through toddlerhood. Phoebe grabbed the seat of the ride-on car. I'm not really sure what her intention was. Did she want to sit on the seat whilst Amelie pushed, or was she helping Amelie push it? Either way both children were playing with the same toy and Amelie couldn't get on with the business of walking. Which is a very serious business for a 10 month old. She got very frustrated and the tears came again.

Phoebe stopped what she was doing and hugged Amelie.

It was so cute but it was also evidence that my little baby is developing theory of mind. This is a big milestone in social and pyschological development. Baby girls show empathy as young as 6 months old, when they cry in response to other babies crying. Phoebe's behaviour demonstrated an ability to empathise, and to understand cause and effect. She could see that what she was doing was upsetting Amelie so she stopped. She has also learnt that when she is upset we cuddle her and it makes her feel better and so she hugged Amelie, presumably to help to make her feel better.

From the limited reading I have done, Phoebe seems remarkably young to be developing such skills. I do wonder to what extent her time at daycare has helped her social development. Certainly being in the company of other children and learning how to behave in social situations must be a contributing factor. Some of it is also her personality. She has always been the kind of baby who likes to play with others, in as much as such a young child is capable of playing with others. Unfortunately, the other children generally prefer to play alone and quite often squeal at her when she attempts to play with the same toys.

This is a fascinating period of development and, as Phoebe was a bit fussy a week or two ago, I checked out whether she was in a wonder week. Sure enough, she is just emerging from Wonder Week 55: The World of Programs. I still haven't read the book, although I'd love to. It seems expensive and the local libraries don't have a copy. Previously I have always managed to find a mum who had blogged about it but not this time. There are mentions of it but no one has gone into detail on the skills acquired during this phase. From what I can gather, following the previous period of learning about sequences ("this happens then that happens"), this is more about cause and effect, if-then (speaking my language now), that is, "if this happens then that happens. But if this happens than something else happens". This certainly seems to fit in with the understanding Phoebe was demonstrating yesterday.

Pride in the name of Love

Recently I was thinking about how ridiculously proud of the slightest things we parents become. Specifically I was amazed at the development of Phoebe's fine motor skills and her ability to deduce how things work.

When we were in the UK a few months back my mam bought her a rattle in the shape of an octopus. The octopus is wearing a hat with a star on the top and when you press the star it lights up, flashes and plays one of three nursery rhymes. If you press it again it plays a different nursery rhyme. I often give this to Phoebe to play with whilst I'm changing or dressing her to stop her wriggling around and a few weeks ago I was impressed to observe her quite deliberately pressing the button.

Then a couple of weeks ago when I was putting her nappies away she grabbed a disposable nappy and started stretching out, like you would if you were just about to put it on. (For those not in the know, as I wasn't before I had a baby, disposable nappies come all neatly folded up and stuck together and you have to kind of pull them apart before you put them on). During this activity she stopped what she was doing, picked up the octopus and pressed his hat then put him back down again and continued playing with the nappy. When the music stopped she did it again. It was as though she decided she'd like to listen to music whilst she worked. It was really funny but also very cute and impressive. She's quite clearly a child genius and far advanced of her months.

She also has a toy truck full of blocks, which her Nan got her from the Baby Markets a few months ago. It is battery operated but didn't seem to do much other than beep and flash its headlights when you switch it on. You can also place the blocks into a hole and it plays a short piece of music. Phoebe has since not only discovered that when you lift and empty the tray at the back it plays a longer piece of music, but also that you can just lift the tray up and press the button underneath it to get the music to play. Clever girl. I am so proud.

Despite not being a big fan of plastic battery-powered toys, and preferring more sustainable, endurable wooden toys, I have to admit to having given in and bought Phoebe some of the former for Christmas. The joy she gets time and again from watching lights flash and grooving to music makes it worth buying a few of these sorts of toys. So I have bought her a set of Fisher Price drums and a Little Tikes Ride-On. And of course some little bits and pieces and loads of books. I did buy some of her gifts from a charity shop though for a bit of conscience-easing recycling. I will probably open her gifts from other people before deciding which of ours to give her and might hold some back for a week or two or save them for her birthday or later in the year. I'll definitely do this with the books as I think I got her about 12 altogether and Lucie gave her a couple for Christmas too.

Phoebe loves her books though and we love reading to her so there'll never be too many in this house. We have story books in her bedroom which we read at naptimes and there are colourful and textured ones in the lounge, which she loves to pull off the shelf and read. She particularly likes to point at things. She takes books to look at in the car and in her pram. Finally, I see something of myself in her.

She has inherited my love of music too and bops around whenever she hears it playing. Generally she just sways from side to side but she loves to pick up rattles and shake them, not exactly in time to the music but then I'm no musician either (although I did pass my Grade II violin exam).

Before I go I should report that Phoebe's first experience of daycare went really well. We took her down for an orientation session on Monday. She was a bit tired and had slept late so we ended up only leaving her for an hour after staying with her for about 40 minutes. I breastfed her before I left as she was being a bit whingy and clingy. Often a breastfeed is a bit like a personality transplant for Phoebe and this day was no exception. Immediately, she was off interacting with the other babies and playing with toys, and when I said goodbye to her she totally ignored me. They gave her some of the food we'd taken down with us and, until she saw me at the door when I returned to collect her and crawled over to me whinging, apparently she was absolutely fine and as good as gold. So that's all really good news and Toby and I are quite excited about her going there. The carers all seem lovely and the centre is bright, clean and modern. And they have loads of books so she'll be in her element. Thanks Linda for helping us get a spot!

This might well be my last post before Christmas so Merry Christmas. I'm very excited about my first Christmas as a mother. I took Phoebe to see Santa Claus and she was a very good girl so I think he'll be kind.

Phoebe's new walker

Phoebe received an early birthday/Christmas present from her Great Gran in England today: a V-Tech baby walker. Seems silly to wait for Christmas to give it to her as she'll probably be walking by then. She thinks it's pretty cool, although spends most of her time walking it backwards so that she can push the buttons. Ooh pretty colours. She looks so little next to it. I guess they're made for slightly bigger babies.

Where did the time go?

One month since my last update, four months since Phoebe was born (18 weeks tomorrow)... where did the time go?

Little Miss P has changed so much over the last 4 weeks. Just in the last few days she has taken to sucking her bottom lip (teething, perhaps?) and it totally changes the look of her face. She looks really funny. She cries less and is more vocal, shouting when she's a bit annoyed about something. About two weeks ago at Gymbaroo she rolled by herself down the soft play wedge and has since rolled quite a few times, including onto her back during mat time at Gymbaroo when she got fed up with being on her tummy.

She has also started to commando crawl although doesn't go very far and gets tired easily. Last night Toby put her down on her tummy in the middle of a large floor cushion then went to run her bath. When I next looked at her she was on the edge of the cushion and then she rolled off it.

As well as continuing with her standing fetish, she is now learning to sit and is getting pretty good at doing it on her own although I suspect her cloth nappies may help a bit by giving her a stable base. She definitely has the strength to sit up on her own but needs to work on her balance a bit. She can stay still for a few seconds but then she topples over, which she seems to think is great fun. If she's holding onto something, such as my finger or a toy then she can balance for much longer.

She seems to be over her fear of going to bed. I think we really only get the tears when she's overtired. She is now so long (about 62cm) that when she's in her baby bath she can rest her head at one end and touch the other end with her feet. She can lie there without us having to hold onto her and it seems to really relax her. We follow this up with a massage and a feed and most nights she's asleep or dozing before she even gets to her cot. Other nights she talks or whinges herself to sleep for a while and then we have the odd night where she's really hard work and needs jiggling, suckling and lots of patience before she'll drop off.

Ha! I leave my computer for a few hours and suddenly that last paragraph doesn't ring quite so true anymore. Phoebe had her jabs on Tuesday. That night we went out for curry with my colleagues as Linda was visiting from U.S. and consequently Pheebs had a late night (although she did nap for about an hour whilst we were eating - she's such a considerate baby). Since then she seems to want to fall asleep at the breast in the evenings, only it takes her a while. I have a new rule: three sucks without a swallow and she gets pulled off. Do that three times and tea-time is over. She doesn't seem to like this rule much. On Wednesday night I gave her my finger to suck, which she did and when she was almost asleep I took this away from her too. She happily sucked her tongue until she fell asleep. I smugly put her in her cot thinking the following night she could suck her tongue and fall asleep after I put her in her cot. Only she didn't fall for the finger trick that night, nor tonight. She just cried and tried to find my boobie. It took me almost an hour to get her to bed both nights.

We have now elevated one end of her mattress in case she has reflux. I did this a few weeks ago and it seemed to work but I've no idea whether that was what worked tonight as I tried lots of other things too: "divine drops" to stop her screaming (a "baby yoga" move which consists of me squatting down really quickly to give her the feeling that she's falling; for some reason babies love this and even when she's really upset she can't help but smile); a dummy, which she spat out but which distracted her from her whinging; the jiggle, which consists of me walking around the bedroom in a jiggly manner whilst cuddling her; and the chest pat. Something worked and I don't really care which it was.

She was frantically sucking on her hands whilst winding down tonight and when I put my finger in her mouth she bit down quite hard. With that and the bottom lip sucking I wonder if she has teeth that are bothering her. Perhaps that, rather than her injections, is what is upsetting her.

She was fine after her jabs (other than wanting to suckle all night) but has a hard bruise on her left leg below the point where the needle went in. In Australia the poor wee things get so many vaccinations. Firstly, they get an oral dose of a vaccination against Rotavirus, which causes nasty gastroenteritis. Then, they simultaneously get two jabs, one in each thigh. One includes DPT (diptheria-pertussis (i.e. whooping cough)-tetanus) plus Polio, Hepatitus B and HiB (Haemophilus influenza type b), a throat infection that can lead to meningitis. That's six vaccinations in one injection! In the other leg they get a vaccination against Pneumococcal, which can cause all sorts of nasties, including meningitis and pneumonia. They get these when they're two, four and six months old.

Phoebe still sometimes wakes up in the night. She usually wakes when I go to bed or around midnight and then again at about 5.30am but this varies. Last night she went to bed around 7.30 then woke at 10.30pm when I went to bed and again at 3.30am and then 6.30am when we all got up. I'm not at all used to all this night-time activity so I'm a bit tired and I'm off to bed in a minute. I've given up trying to make her nap in the middle of the day. I just let her sleep when she's tired and hope that it fits in with what I'm doing. She seems so much happier when we're out and about but she doesn't feed or sleep particularly well in public these days. If I can reduce her stimulation by placing her in the pram and walking around with the insect cover over her then she can get a good sleep but she'll generally feed for long enough to stop feeling hungry and then find something to distract her again. I think this is partly why she's waking up at night. Even if we're home in the morning she's already had two really good feeds at night or early in the morning so she isn't that hungry later on.

Phoebe's rainforest play gym arrived and she loves it. We hang all sorts of other toys from it too and change these around so she doesn't get bored. In the mornings she quite likes to watch the lights and listen to the music and when she gets tired she just chills out on it. But in the afternoon she can't bear the lights and music and we often do more physical games on the floor or a cushion, such as "Wash the dishes", a Gymbaroo game which involves Phoebe being turned upside down, the Sitty-Uppy and Standy-Uppy games (which she now does at Gymbaroo too), tummy time, which she's now excellent at and uses the opportunity to do some commando crawling, which I sometimes assist with by holding her feet so she can push away from my hands (another exercise we learned at Gymbaroo) and lying on her back and rolling.

Another exciting new arrival is our passports. Yes, Phoebe and I now have Australian passports and our trip is only 4 weeks away. Phoebe will be trying solids soon too, perhaps when we're away or maybe just before we go so that Toby can be involved. I haven't got any of the stuff yet though and I'm trying to decide what I absolutely need to get beforehand and what I can make do with until we get back.

Right then... I'm off to see if I can sneak into bed without waking the Hungry Hippo.

The Bath Incident

Tonight, whilst I was feeding Phoebe, Toby ran the big bath for us before heading outside to cover the trailer with a tarp. Once or twice a week we like to all get into our huge spa bath together rather than bath Phoebe in her little baby bath. We get just as wet with the little baby bath and it's nowhere near as much fun for us.

I am starting to reduce Phoebe's daytime feeds by trying to ensure that she empties one breast before I offer the other. I'm sure we were doing that anyway but I wasn't very mindful of it. Sometimes this can take a little while, especially as we are just settling down and getting back into the swing of things after Phoebe's mammoth growth spurt. So, after some time spent feeding and still being able to hear the bath water going and still being able to see Toby outside faffing with the tarp I attempted to call him to go and check on the bath. The trouble is I have laryngitis and he probably wouldn't have been able to hear me anyway but as I had no voice there was no hope really. So eventually, apologising profusely to Phoebe who looked at me rather stunned, I hauled myself up off the sofa and trotted off to the bathroom whilst trying to allow her to continue feeding.

I wish I'd taken a photograph, and if I hadn't have been breastfeeding I probably would have; I got there in the nick of time. Suddenly letting Phoebe continue to feed became the least of my worries... managing to hold onto her whilst I hurriedly leaned over the bath to turn off the taps was the new challenge. The weird little indent that looks like a seat at the side of the bath was completely flooded and the sides of the bath were covered in water and about 1cm off going over the edge. And it's a BIG bath!!! Good job our dams are 70% full at the moment. The news stations reported a predicted storm surge for last night... and we nearly got it in our bathroom tonight, I tell ya.

As I returned to the living room, Phoebe back on the breast now the excitement was over, Toby saw me through the window and said something, I forget what but he was obviously enquiring as to why I was breastfeeding whilst wandering around the house and did I need a hand with anything. "The bath," I croaked and his response was something like "oh s*@t!". Indeed.

In other news...

Phoebe is now settling back down and has slept through for the last two nights. Of course I now have to get up to express milk again but hopefully that will pass. I have given up trying to see a pattern in her routine but I think one will slowly form again over the coming weeks and I am trying some new things after reading a book a friend sent, such as trying to get her to take a long nap at lunch time and shorter naps in the morning and afternoon. That might prove more difficult once we're out and about during the week though. I often go out after her morning nap and don't get back until after lunch so unless I go for a walk with her in the pram and put off coming home until later then she will have a shorter nap. I might try getting out earlier or later in the day and see if that works out for us. Another thing I've started doing is giving her bedtime feed in the bedroom with some nice music playing. It doesn't seem to stop her from whinging when we try to put her to bed though but tonight it was more of a winey chat than a scream so maybe she'll settle down over time.

As I get my Australian citizenship this week, and I have decided to have a barbecue on Saturday afternoon to celebrate I would like to have a few beers so we're trying to get Phoebe to take a bottle, without much success. After she screamed at Toby during one feed yesterday I then let her play with the bottle for a while before her next feed when she wasn't very hungry. She was interested but not enough to actually drink from it. Today we just didn't really get much chance to introduce her to it again and I'm running out of time. Every day I express some milk and that gets put into the bottle for her to play with later on and gradually get used to the idea. But I also need to find time to express a bit more to freeze and feed her with on Saturday. Today I didn't get the chance. Maybe I'll have to stick to a light beer or two straight after a feed but that's not very Australian now is it?

And finally, something I got rather excited about... before Phoebe was born I spotted a rather cool looking play mat on my friend's photographs and enquired as to the brand: The Fisher Price Rainforest Gym. When I found it in the shops it was about $120 although at one stage I did see it on special for $90 or $100. But then Lucie told me someone she knew of was selling a Lottie Ladybird mat (worth about $200!) so I ended up getting that, a bouncer and a couple of bits and pieces for $70. 

Since then Phoebe has visited two houses with the Rainforest gym and she loves it. She already has two activity mats as her Nan bought her a different Fisher Price mat (see a photo of Phoebe on it) lately which she also loves. But the Rainforest gym is bigger, you can easily add other toys to it and she seems so much more mobile when lying on it. In fact she wiggled around 90 degrees on Thursday and I thought I'd picked her up and put her down without remembering (mums do that kind of thing) until a few minutes later she'd almost gone full circle. 

So I thought I'd have a look online and see whether anyone had it on special. And what do I find? A local woman selling one second-hand on eBay! I made sure I was home for the end of the auction this afternoon and got it for $61, $1 over my budget but what the hell? I know Toby thinks three activity mats is too many and he wants me to sell one, and I might sell Lottie Ladybird but then babies get bored so quickly and we do have a big house so I can put them in different rooms. Personally I think I got it for a good price and it was something I've wanted for a while so I'm happy. The Ladybird mat just isn't that engaging for her now that she can reach out and bat toys so I think the new one will be good for her development. I'm reluctant to sell it just yet though as perhaps it will be good for her later when she's at a different stage. I'll sell them all eventually. Here's a photo of her with her friends Julian and Hugo, the centre of attention as the only girl. Julian doesn't look too impressed that Phoebe is hogging his play mat though.

I know I said "finally" at the start of the last paragraph but that was before I knew what I'm about to tell you, which is not good news. My Picasa account has reached its limit which means I can't add any more photos to Phoebe's album. And just when she was getting interesting too. I'm going to see if I can persuade Toby to let me purchase a storage upgrade.

So, until that happens, here's one final cute-as photo of my beautiful babe just so that remaining megabyte of storage doesn't go to waste: