Bump Update 28 Weeks – Hello 3rd Trimester!

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28 weeksToday I am 28 weeks pregnant which means I am now officially into my third trimester! No wonder I have been feeling so tired ;). I can’t believe how much faster this pregnancy is going, she is going to be here before we know it! Yipes!

So what’s been going on? Well I saw the midwife today and my bump is measuring bang on for 28 weeks, so that’s good. I also had my whooping cough vaccination, which is a new thing as I didn’t have it when I was pregnant with Monkey. Unfortunately it seems that whooping cough has come back a bit recently and there have been deaths, so it the vaccination is now offered to all pregnant women when they are 28 weeks +pregnant. What I didn’t realise was that they don’t give you the whooping cough on it’s own, but it comes with Diphtheria and Tetanus vaccinations in the same jab.

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Let Kids be Kids linky 12/08/14

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The lovely Karen over at Let Kids be Kids is away on holiday this week down in gorgeous Cornwall, and she has asked me to host this week’s Let Kids be Kids linky! I jumped at the chance as this is one of my favourite linkys to join in with!

There are always so many great posts with fab ideas for good old childhood fun, both indoors and outdoors, I always get so much inspiration from everyone’s posts!

We have been loving this summer and having loads of fun with outdoor play lately, although the cooler weather seems to have set in too this weekend with a lot of rain forcing play indoors! Hopefully we still have some summer fun ahead of us yet though 🙂

Right, on to the linky!

This is a linky all about letting kids be kids, getting back to basics and having great childhood fun. We live in such a fast paced modern world with so much technology and stresses round every corner, we often need to be reminded to just ‘play’ and have fun, it’s healthy for us all (yes, that includes you parents!).

Please join Karen (and I) in spreading the word, for encouraging children to step away from the technology for a while and go out, run around, use their imaginations and just have general basic FUN!

There’s not many rules, just link up your posts (screen free), old or new, about genuine childhood fun (of any age). It may be fun outdoors, jumping in puddles, nature hunts, riding bikes or making mud pies. Or it may be fun indoors with arts and crafts, making dens, cooking, messy play or reading. Or how about visiting a farm or fun at a fete. Or a discussion about children growing up too fast, etc.

Whatever basic fun you have been having or discussing, link up and share your ideas, visit others to get inspiration and comment on as many as you can to give each other encouragement and support, but most importantly, HAVE FUN!

This linky will open every Tuesday for 6 days, so there’s plenty of time to add your posts.

Please spread the word and grab the badge below!

 

If you tweet me your link (@BecomingaSAHM), I will happily retweet.

Ten Easy Ideas for Outdoor Play

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Regular readers may remember that at the start of the year we put a lot of time and effort into Operation Garden renovation. Turning our junk heap of a garden into a nice place to be. We hoped it would be ready in time for the summer, so that a lot of time could be spent outside enjoying it. With me being pregnant we were particularly keen on this idea as it would mean that there would be days where I could easily occupy Monkey outdoors, without having to go anywhere! The good news is that we managed this and have already been spending a lot of time out there, doing various activities (I will list some of our favourites below).

For Monkey’s birthday in May we bought a second hand climbing frame on ebay complete with swing and slide, to have in the garden. Unfortunately with all of the illness that surrounded his birthday weekend we never actually put it up, and with one thing and another we just hadn’t ever got around to putting it up! This all changed last weekend though and we finally have a lovely climbing frame in use in our garden!

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Family Fun at the Burghley Film Festival 2014

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Not too far away from us is the very grand Burghley House, a beautiful Elizabethan house in amazing grounds. Every year they hold an outdoor film festival and last year we went for the first time. During the day they show family films and then have an evening session with more adult films. After loving it last year we decided well in advance that we wanted to go again this year, and invited some of our family to come along too!

This year we went to see ‘Epic’ which is a film I hadn’t seen before, but in all honesty, with a toddler and other kiddies in the family we only really get to see snippets of the film, as the day is more about running around and having fun!
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Getting Shipshape

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We’ve had quite a lot going on this week in an effort to be more organised and to get the house shipshape! This weekend coming we have some lovely friends coming to stay from Newcastle, and we are so very excited to see them, as we last went to visit them last August, and our boys have all grown since then and we can’t wait to catch up! This has also been a kick up the proverbial backside as  our house has been a tip lately.

Because my pelvis has been pretty bad the last few weeks the housework has really suffered as I have been lying down a lot more. Hubby has been doing his best bless him, but he works so hard, and we’ve also been hard at work decorating the baby room, and well there is only so much he can do! So this week we took a good look around us and decided it was time to do something about it. Thankfully my pelvis hasn’t been quite so bad this last week (touch wood, fingers crossed, hope I am not jinxing myself by talking about it) so I have also been able to help him a bit more.

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Maternity Wear for a Summer Wedding

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My wedding outfit at 8 months pregnant with Monkey

My wedding outfit at 8 months pregnant with Monkey

In a few weeks’ time we are off to a lovely summer wedding! I love a good wedding and so always look forward to them. My biggest worry though, was with being about 7 months pregnant at the time, what on earth should I wear?? We went to a few weddings when I was pregnant with Monkey, and I had a fairly cheap Maxi dress, which at the time I thought I looked ok in. In hindsight, I just looked massive, and basically felt like a huge column of wide! I’m not great in maxi dresses normally, I think other ladies look lovely in them but I have never found one that suits my shape. Being pear shaped I have also felt they make me look wider than I actually am.

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Mega Bloks Junior Builders review

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I was recently contacted by the lovely people at Mega Bloks to review their Junior Builders Build a Story set. Monkey loves building so I jumped at the chance. When I think of Mega Bloks I think of them being the big, chunky blocks, and what I didn’t realise before was that they also do some smaller building blocks, which are perfect for Monkey. I am not sure how to describe them without mentioning the Duplo range from Lego, as that is exactly the size that they are. They are completely compatible and if you mixed them up together, without looking closely at the branding you would not be able to tell the difference between the two ranges!

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When Messy Play goes wrong…

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I love a bit of messy play with Monkey, it is usually great fun and also a great way for him to learn. It is one of my favourite things, as a SAHM to be able to do these things with him. Sometimes though…. it really doesn’t go as well as I would hope. Last week is a good example of this.

I read a great post a couple of weeks ago about playing with coloured foam. It wasn’t something I had seen before so we definitely hadn’t tried it. It looked great, the blogger’s little one loved it and all went well. So, one afternoon last week I decided we should give it a go. It did not go quite so well for us.

coloured foam

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Impromptu Nature Hunt

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One day, a week or so back, Daddy forgot his lunch. Monkey and I wandered over after we had eaten ours to take him something. Can’t have Daddy starving and luckily he only works a few minutes walk away. We stayed for a natter and a play and then headed home again. Monkey decided he wanted to walk rather than buggy it home, and I have no problem with that, although it took a little longer than normal, as he also decided it was time for a bit of a nature hunt!

It started off by looking at the flowers, then he decided he wanted to keep the pretty yellow flowers (aka weeds but who cares) so they got popped in his pocket. It was one of the wet cooler days so he had on his little raincoat and needed a bit of help opening the velcro pockets (especially when also clutching a stick in his other hand) but he very much liked patting them down again once they were safely inside.

Then he spotted some daisies, and well he has always loved daises, so a few of those got popped in his pocket too. As we wandered more and more got popped in his little pockets, including pine cones and twigs, and pretty soon we had quite a haul!

nature hunt

 

Just a cute little habit or the beginning of kleptomania? 😉 I’m only kidding.

We have done nature hints before but they very much led by me, so it was lovely to see him taking an interest himself. Plus it was a nice way to occupy him for a while!

Do your little ones like nature hunts?

Country Kids from Coombe Mill Family Farm Holidays Cornwall

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#BabyBabble

Parenting

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There has been a few stories in the media recently that have really made me stop and think about parenting, and therefore what I want for Monkey and baba as they grow up.

The first was an article about a mum who gives her 2 and 4 year old daughters spray tans, pierced ears, manicures and hair pieces. I’m pretty big on the whole live and let live mindset. We all have to parent our kids in our own way and I try really hard not to criticise others, but… the article made me feel uncomfortable. Largely because I worry about how the girls are going to feel about themselves growing up. If they are so focussed on their appearance now, how will they ever feel happy in their own skin. Will they always feel that they aren’t good about themselves unless they have spray tans, fake hair and make-up on? It just feels like a symptom of a much bigger problem that does worry me as the kids grow up.
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