Testing the iZi Go

As you know I was lucky enough to be chosen by Nursery Trader to test a brilliant Be Safe car seat. I was over the moon  to see that my initial thoughts have been published today you can read the article here

Mysterious Magic Moments ....

Last night I heard a wail, popping termite back in the crib I ran downstairs to see what was up. Peanut was crying and trying to explain why she felt poorly and with some sort of sixth sense I grabbed the nearest vessel and managed to catch the bulk of Sunday's dinner in a cup as it flew back out of her poor stunned mouth! Holding back her hair for the next ten minutes as my poor girl called to the porcelain gods was not a nice situation to be in.We all hate our kids being poorly and it makes us feel so helpless, so its horrible to have to just stand and watch while they are so miserable.

So after cleaning her up, settling her into bed and having some cuddles, I went back to bed, another feed for Termite and then more noise from the bedrooms, this time The Golden Child whimpering in his sleep, I soon realise all is not well, he was boiling hot and confused and in pain, so medicine administered I settled him back to bed .... The rest of my night followed a similar routine, alternating between sick children and a hungry baby, medicine giving and head stroking.By 5am I was in a tangled pile of limbs as all 5 of us snuggled in Mummy and Daddy's bed!

Now this post is not intended to gain sympathy, in fact I'm writing this because quite bizarrely in the midst of being covered in partially digested food, and being a milk machine and nurse, I had an overwhelming feeling of peace and happiness. Despite the obvious glamour of my night , I fixed my babies and provided comfort. I made them feel safe and loved and cared for. I am a MUM and I LOVE EVERY MOMENT, even these particularly magic ones where my glamour shines out like a beacon (or not).

Whats the strangest situation that has made you realise how amazing parenthood is?

Silent Sunday

The Discipline Dilema

So I've heard of parents who don't believe in saying no to their children, I've read a lot on gentle discipline, and briefly read about more corporal approaches.

My personal choice is to use lots of positive praise alongside the understanding that unacceptable behaviour has consequences, these include time out, loss of treats, a heart taken down from our reward chart or the temporary loss of a toy. We've made it to almost 5yrs old with peanut and it's always worked well.....

But for the last 6 weeks she has had some anger issues, normally at the end of the school week and always an explosion out of the blue but she lashes out, hitting kicking and screaming.

We've been to see the teacher who was shocked at the descriptions of 'one of the classes most sensible and responsible girls' yes that's a direct quote! Someone her teacher says can be trusted to do as she's asked and always is lovely. 

I find myself feeling really low about it all and unsure what to do. My dream child is becoming something terribly aggressive and cross and I find it so upsetting to see her behave in such a way. We've never allowed them to watch anything violent or aggressive (not even Tom and Jerry!) we don't hit or scream at them and the rare physical sibling fights are nipped immediately in the bud so this choice of tantrum has surprised us A LOT !

Today after a lengthy and horrid episode she shared that she was cross because we didn't go out as planned today (understandable) and she wishes I wasn't her mum and Termite wasn't her sister! 

And so realisation dawned, unlike the unquestioning acceptance we saw when the golden child arrived, Peanut literally looked at him and stated Ooh a baby, we now have a whole bunch of mixed up emotions and insecurities which she can't form into an explanation for us and is instead turning to violence. 

She is shown lots of love, praise and attention. She spends time holding the baby and helping so that she feels included, we have one on one story time and conversation time so we are a bit lost as to how best to move away from this behaviour. 

So my question to any of you reading this is .... How do we deal with this sympathetically yet firmly but without making her feel any more insecure! Suggestions in the comments box please...

Fluffy Bottoms

So this week has been the start of us using cloth nappies.

I've been collecting cloth nappies throughout my pregnancy, from friends and buying on special offers, I even won one from the lovelies at Fuzzibunz. So I was fully prepared to go all guns blazing but a friend shared that she waited until 6 ish weeks before she started using cloth just to concentrate on establishing breastfeeding and getting through the early days.

I've found myself somewhat nervous about starting though, the washing, the ick factor, would we get nappy rash, will I get fed up with it quickly, and somehow we've gotten to 8 weeks without trying so I decided it was bullet biting time.....

I don't know what I was worried about, its so easy and the nappies are sooooooo cute. We've really just taken to it, Termite is happy and comfortable and the nappies are no different to put on than disposables, I've noticed a difference already in how much rubbish were producing and I'm enjoying trying out all the different types. I will of course review them all so you can see what I think but in the mean time I would love if you fluffy mummy's tell me what your favourite types of nappy are, and your best tips for using them? 

Silent Sunday

All About Me......

Ive been tagged in a meme by the fabulous Kate at Family Fever and the lovely Colette  from We're Going On an Adventure. It all started when Gina from Cold Tea and Smelly Nappies received an 'all about me' booklet from school to fill out for her daughter. I'm sure we've all seen them, but she thought, and I agree, it would be fun to try it in Blogland!

First things first - your name and what you do?
OK I'm Karen (AKA The Monkeyfooted Mummy) I'm a SAHM, blogger and reviewer. I'm also an Operations Manager, Administrator, Personal Shopper, Chauffeur, Nurse, Adviser, Accountant, Chef, Teacher and Cleaner!!!!

I live at home with....
My husband 3 children - Peanut 4, The Golden Child 3, and Termite 7 weeks

My favourite thing to do is...
Spend time with those I love, visit the Theatre or go to a visitor Attraction.

My favourite thing to eat is...
Sweet - Chocolate
Savoury - Mexican

When I get cross I...
Normally cry in frustration.
Sometimes I worry because...
My kids are growing up in a changing and sometimes scary world. Also I worry about losing those close to me.

My favourite book is...
Too many to choose, I love Olivia Joules and the Overactive Imagination, PS I Love you and The Baby Whisperer Solves All Your Problems!

My favourite toy is...
My iPhone. I'm unsure what anyone did before smartphones, I pay bills, organise, blog and watch TV
 
I dislike...
Irresponsible dog owners, selfish road users, selfishness and prejudice
 
When I grow up I want to be...
I would love to be a Teacher or have a career in Solving Problems for people!
Right that's me and now its time to learn more about some others so I am tagging 5 other bloggers who I want to join in the fun!

Wendy at Little Mans Mum

Kate at Confessions of a New Mum

Tami at Mummy of Two

Penny at Lillies and Love

Anna at Chickhatcher

Frugi Competition

As you all know I'm a Frugi Fledgling, I love to help them build their customer base as they really do sell the most brilliant clothes and accessories. You can find out more about them in my reviews here and here

Well those lovely folks at Frugi have offered my readers a chance to win £30 in vouchers to spend on anything you want from their website simply fill out the rafflecopter entries below and dont forget to leave a comment telling me what you would order if you won. Don't forget all my lovely readers get 15% discount with code Holly.

a Rafflecopter giveaway

National Baking Week

I love a good cake, my kids love baking and I believe that they should be helping in the kitchen and learning early. Plus busy hands can't cause mischief! So to celebrate national baking week we made some cakes. Now my first port of call is always Bero. I've had a Bero recipe book as long as I can remember and pretty much every woman in my family has had one , mine is passed on from my Nana so it's really really old but I love it. I do have a shiny new one as you can still buy them, but the old one holds sentimental value for me !

We followed this recipe, and started by weighing and measuring 2 eggs, 3oz caster Sugar, 3oz self raising flour, this is good number work for the kids and I like to have everything to hand ready to go.

Next we Heated oven to 180ºC,and set out our cake cases in muffin tins cracked eggs into a bowl, whisked lightly, added the sugar and whisked well until thick, creamy and almost white in colour. Folded in the flour and we were ready to fill up the cake cases.

Then we set the timer popped them

In the oven and in no time at all lovely fresh sponge cakes for us .....

And a great big pile of dishes too!

What's your favourite thing to bake with the family ? 

Silent Sunday

Rice is Nice

Monkey Towers has been struck by illness recently so planning and preparation has fallen by the wayside. Last night we found ourselves without tea prepared so I ended up making one of our favourite but quick and simple recipes... Fried Rice.

Here's how we do it

3 eggs beaten with some soy sauce and Chinese spice, cooked in a pan until it's like scrambled egg. Remove and keep to one side.

Heat a little spray oil in a wok and fry some onions, peppers and frozen sweet corn (chop the onions and peppers into small cubes) 

Add some cooked and cooled rice to the pan and keep stirring until warm through. (We find its nicer if the rice has been cooked the day before so it has dried properly) 

We added some good quality ham at this point chopped finely

Add the egg and mix well 

Serve and enjoy 

The whole family enjoy this and its so versatile you can put anything you fancy in it. 

Silent Sunday

My Worst Enemy

It's 5.24am and I'm feeding Termite for the second time tonight, I'm recovering from a bout of sudden and nasty Mastitis so feeling a bit run down and  I'm thinking, as I know you all do, how much more sleep I can get before we start our day at about 7am. I'm also making a mental list of all of the things I need to do, and then stressing because at 5 weeks Termite is obviously still rather needy, I have 6 school runs to do every day and the time in between never seems long enough to manage anything productive.

At this point I try to remind myself that I'm putting on a wash every day, emptying and reloading my dishwasher, cooking or preparing 3 meals a day and keeping the mess to the minimum (most days). These are all achievements, small ones, but as I have been reminded they are still achievements.

After spending this evening chatting, about how to be more organised and how long it will take to get back to normal, with a group of mums I've never met but have known for over a year, I feel better but have been told in no uncertain terms that at 5 weeks I shouldn't be worrying about working, being perfect or having amazing organisation and routine yet. I'm reminded how kind these ladies are, how over the last year we have between us had immense reasons to celebrate but also suffered losses and grief and through it all we have been on our respective keyboards a great source of support for each other.

This leads me to the reason for this post's title, I am my own worst enemy, I am very critical of myself, I hate to ask for help and I expect a lot of myself. I think in this respect I am actually the same as most mums out there. We are not kind to ourselves and we should be, we should be celebrating our awesomeness and building each other up. I know we all judge ourselves and compare ourselves to others, most of us also probably judge others, but that's a different post, and I know most of us would find ourselves lacking when in truth we are not.

So today I think we should all pat ourselves on the back for being awesome. We brought life into this world and we work from morning to night trying our hardest to provide the right diet, the right amount of exercise, the right type and amount of discipline, the right parenting style..... my days the list is endless but we do it and we do it to the best of our abilities and for that we deserve a great big high five. So the next time I find myself standing in judgement of myself I'm going to try to remember this post and list some things I have achieved that day even if, like a wise fellow mum said to me today, its only that we managed to survive ;-)

Room 101

A short while ago I was tagged in a meme by the truly amazing Chantelle at Mama Mummy Mum , so my challenge is to choose 3 things I would condemn to room 101. At first I thought this would be easy but its harder than I thought so here goes....

1.Velvet

I know it sounds strange, but I just can't stand the stuff. It makes me cringe to touch and to me is honestly worse than wet wool! I would rather go to the dentist than touch it!

     

2. Moths

I'm not sure this needs much explanation, I firmly believe in not killing insects so with spiders despite my terrific fear I can pop a cup over and take them outside, not so with moths, they flutter and flap and are swift and cunning. Evil creatures in my humble opinion!

 

 3. Technology at Meal Times

 

People using, mobiles, tablets, games etc during dinner really annoys me, don't get me wrong we have allowed our children to use their innotabs whilst we wait for a meal in a restaurant, but once the ordering etc is done then its social time. If you need to text, tweet or facebook it should wait. I think its ignorant to speak to the world of social media or your mates instead of your family.