On Sleeping........

Alice just won't fall asleep in her cot,
I'm not sure if she's cold, or if she's too hot,
or maybe she just doesn't like it a lot,
but Alice just won't fall asleep in her cot.

Alice just won't fall asleep in her chair,
it's comfy and bouncy, but she doesn't care,
she would much rather be in the chair over there,
Oh! Alice just won't fall asleep in her chair.

Alice just won't fall asleep on her mat,
it's got pictures of fish on, it's cosy and flat,
but Alice does not care too much about that,
Oh! Alice just won't fall asleep on her mat.

Alice just won't fall asleep on our bed,
she wriggles and squirms and her face goes bright red,
she looks up at me pleading; "take me somewhere instead!"
Oh! Alice just won't fall asleep on our bed.

So we've tried in her cot and we've tried in her chair
We've tried on her mat, on our bed, on the stair,
in the kitchen, the bathroom, the room over there,
Where will you sleep, Alice, Oh! where? where? where?

I pick up little Alice and hold her in my arms,
She gives a big yawn and her grumpy face calms,
and next thing, she's asleep, counting sheep on the farm,
Oh! Alice is fast, fast asleep in my arms!!!!

Alice just won't fall asleep in her cot,
it turns out that her cot is just not the right spot,
She just wants a big hug snuggled next to my chest,
forget all the rest, daddy.........hugs are the best!!!

Carried Away

Oh, I am sorry.  It's been a long time since we last spoke.  You must be thinking that I had abandoned you.   I promise I haven't...but I've gone back to work now and I'm weaning you a teeny weeny bit.  Every once in a while I will leave you crying in your cot waiting for attention....and if I don't respond straight away, then I can assure you its for our own good in the long run.  I believe it's called "Tough Love" (a phrase I have literally just seen on Supernanny ?!?!) But we're back together again now and I promise you, you won't miss anything!  It has been over a week though, and we have a lot to catch up on.  So hold on to your small, fleecy, slightly-too-big animal print hats - this could be a long one!

I know you're all waiting for piccies....so here 's a cutey to get us rolling:

Missed me?

Before we catch up on what has been happening in the last week, I just want to update you on some unfinished business on the previous post.  Remember when we last spoke the heats had started to find Alice's best friend and we'd managed to petrify our first born with rubber giraffes and pink rabbits significantly larger than her?  Well, competition is really heating up in the form of Hannah's entry:  all kneel before the mighty Musical Seahorse of Light.  It's pink, it's fluffy, it's stomach glows in the dark and it sings the greatest hits of Beethoven when you squeeze it.  The brainchild of what must have been a drug-frenzied ideas session at Fisher Price, this furry little undersea ally is proving as effective as a pinky finger soaked in gin in getting Alice to sleep.  Nicole's Eeyore is up next on the Best Friend challenge, but I fear unless he is flourescent and can play a plinky-plonk version of Robbie Williams' Angels then the Seahorse could well have it!

By day and by night, Alice just loves hanging out with her seahorse

Ok, so what's been happening this week?  Well, the first thing to report is that Alice has been discharged by the midwife and has been declared a healthy bouncing little baby!   I'm not quite sure how the midwife decides when to discharge a baby, but I think that the reason that she may have chosen to discharge Alice so soon is that Alice was in serious danger of breaking the little set of weighing scales that Mary the Midwife brings along with her.  Lord, can this girl eat! It's also interesting to see how the relationship between Ceri and Alice is driven by feeding.  Years ago, I can remember seeing a documentary on TV about a phenomenon called "Feeders".  These were people who liked their partners to be have serious love handles and would demonstrate their affection for them by liquidising KFCs, Twixes, pork scratchings and lard, and pouring this lovingly prepared recipe into the mouths of their beloved in order to ensure that they stayed supersized.  Now, I'm not for a minute saying that Ceri is this way with Alice, but when I phoned her to ask how the midwife appointment went, she replied:

"I'm so proud of her!  Newborns are supposed to put on about 100g a week, and Alice has put on 600g in a week and a half!  She's in the ninety-fifth percentile for weight, which means she is doing really well.  I think she's putting on more weight than any other babies in the area....."

It'll be interesting to see whether or not Ceri and I feel the same way about only five percent of the population being fatter than Alice when she is a teenager.......but for now we are both glowing with parental pride that our little daughter can medically claim to be a porker!!!  Anyway, here's our little heavyweight saying goodbye to Mary the Midwife on her last visit:

Mary the Midwife struggles to lift our little bundle of joy



On Tuesday of last week, I had to go back to work.  Going back to work after two weeks off is never easy; but when you have to say goodbye to your lovely wife and newborn who are sitting smiling in bed, it's a real wrench when you close the front door and head off to the bus-stop.  Before I went back, we made sure that we made the most of my last few days off with some fun times in Dulwich. 

Friday saw us going back to Dulwich park to see if we could show Alice some of the sights while she was awake.  Amazingly, this time Alice managed to keep her eyes open and actually managed to see some ducks, trees, grass etc.  It's incredible to watch babies reacting to their surroundings, and hard to predict what they will respond to and what they will ignore. Despite all of the cool stuff that there is to do in Dulwich park, the thing that seemed to amaze Alice most was the wind.  She looked genuinely surprised when, all of a sudden, the sun went behind a cloud and a gust of wind blew across her face.  It just goes to show, everyone has been so generous with cuddly toys, books, rattles, games and all along Alice would have been happy if we had simply blown on her face.  The simple things, eh???  (it's also nice to know that she regularly returns the favour and blows wind on her mum and dad whenever she can).  Anyway, here are some choice park pics from our family day in the park:

the wind in the park

Cuddles with mummy and daddy

Alice surprised by the wind

Saturday was an "open house" day with the chance for friends to pop over and meet Alice for the first time.  First to show up were Liam and Sadia who are expecting a baby girl in the next three weeks (and managed to escape the photocall).  We tried our best not to scare them too much with stories of the birth, but it's sooo hard not to go into the gory details in way too much detail. Feel free to share the same with us next month guys!  Sacha and Allan, Kara, Dale and Evie and Gareth, Martha and Charlie also popped by.  Looks like the gorgeous gene is strong in East Dulwich and Alice has got some work to do to keep up with Martha, Charlie and Evie on the cute-o-meter!!!

Hey Lady!  Sacha and Alice have a cuddle

Alice meets (another) Gareth and wee Charlie

With Aunty Kara, Uncle Dale and Best-Friend-to-Be Evie

Martha and Charlie decided that Alice didn't look very happy sitting outside in the garden, and that she would prefer to live in a "camp" indoors.  They grabbed some of our bedsheets, made some paintings for the walls and built Alice a den in the corner of our living room.  That is where Alice sleeps to this day!  Martha also remarked when Ceri was breastfeeding that:

"Alice is a very hungry little girl.  She's drinking milk like a goat!"

Seems even four year olds have picked up on Alice's eating habits.  That's a worry!!!  Here are the kids in their den:

Martha, Charlie and their pet goat

And a picture of Evie, coz she's cute

On Sunday, Ceri and I went for lunch in the new Italian, Rocca, in Dulwich Village.  I'm not sure if we went there because Ceri was desperate to get back on the seafood pasta she has missed so much during pregnancy or because we had been there for ice cream two days before and the entire Italian waiting staff had said what a "bella" baby Alice was.  Either way, we had a lovely meal there.  Before we went, Charlotte and Richard dropped in to worship at the shrine of Alice.  Here are the snaps:

Charlotte and Richard make the pilgrimge to East Dulwich

It was an amibition of mine, before I went back to work, to give Alice a bath.  I love baths.  They are up there among my three favourite things in life and the other two I am not publishing on a family website.  Given that Alice bears no genetic resemblance to her dad (people always comment how she has Ceri's eyes, nose, weird big toes, figure - ok, I made up the last one), I was keen to see if she at least shared my fondness for chilling out in the tub of an evening.  So, we got out the Johnson's baby bath, the frog towel that Grandma and Grandpa bought and set the water temperature to "luke warm". I really feel like a dad now that I am dipping my elbow into bath water.  Truth is, I have no idea how warm or cold the water is supposed to feel on my elbow, but you feel like a very responsible and caring parent just going through the motions of doing this.  Anyway, we got the water to the perfect temperature and guess what, dear reader, we put Alice in the tub and she.......loved it!!!  That's my girl!!!  I'm so proud she is a Shepherd after all!!!

bath time!!!



Taking Alice up for her bath made me think just how odd it must be being a baby.  One minute you are sitting there relaxing in your bouncer, and the next minute this happens:

Daddy:  "Do you think Alice needs a bath mummy?"
Mummy:   "Oh, that might be nice, but we did "top and tail" her earlier"
Daddy:  "But I want to prove she is genetically related to me"
Mummy:  "Ok, I'll start the water running"

And the next thing you know you are being picked up out of the chair, where you were very happy, being stripped naked, and dumped in a bowl of luke-warm water.  Weird.  If you did that to an adult without permission, you would end up in prison! Poor little Alice has no choice in where she goes and it's up to Ceri and I to decide whether she "likes it" or not where she is.  We could pop her on top of a wardrobe and she wouldn't be able to do anything about it.  Here are the pics........(oh, come on!  we're not that cruel!!). 

It did make me think, though, that the nearest living being to Alice that I know is my family's pet tortoise - Timmie.   She can be quite happily munching cucumber in the garden only to be picked up by me as a kid (or now my nephews) to come and watch us play badminton on the front lawn.  It must be one of the best things about growing up as a human/not being a tortoise...the freedom not to be picked up and plonked somewhere that you don't want to be.   I wonder if Alice we get revenge on me one day and plonk me in a room with reruns of Sex in the City running on an endless loop.

The other thing I noticed when we bathed Alice is that, in front of the baby, Ceri has started calling me Daddy and I have started calling Ceri Mummy.  That's weird too.  I must make a mental note to know when to call Ceri mummy, and when not to!  So much to think about being a parent!

On Tuesday, Daddy, I mean "I", went back to work and Nanny and Grandcha arrived for a visit along with some more lovely clothes from the Ty Croeso sweat shop.  I'm not sure what mayhem went on while I was in the office but the socialising continued with Helen, Katy and baby Sophia coming to visit.  Here are a couple of pics:

Nanny and Alice

cuddles for Katy

Helen gets the "Sunday Lunch Face"

Sophia and Alice

I'm not sure if it makes me a bad dad to admit this, but I am genuinely not sure which baby is which in the photo above.  I would need to check their big toes to be 100% sure which is my Alice.

The highlight of the working week for me was Ceri, Nanny Lyn and, of course, Alice, coming to visit me in my office.  It's a very proud moment in a chap's life to introduce your newborn daughter to your workmates.  It's also hilarious to see blokes in an office feigning interest in a newborn baby and ensuring that they stay at a "safe distance" -  which means that they are close enough to see the child (just) but are in no danger whatsoever of being offered a hug.  There are no pictures of the GMI visit I am afraid as the work we do is top secret.... perhaps something we will be able to rectify the next time she pops up to see me. The GMI verdict on Alice???

"she looks like her mum.....but then, you look like you wife, Matt.....so, I guess you could say Alice looks like you!"

Well, time is ticking by and by my reckoning its bathtime again.  I know you are all logging in to see Ceri's 30th birthday party pics, but in the spirit of the Eastenders style "duh......duh duh.....duh duh duh duh duh" ending, I am saving those as a cliffhanger for next time......

Thanks again for sticking with the blog, dear reader.  As ever you've been very well behaved and, as well as deserving pudding after your dinner, you have also well and truly earned your five plus one:

The Shepherds

afternoon nap

ooohhhh!

Seahorse slumbers

my girls

Daddy and Alice

And just coz I'm a softy and I love you guys, here's a sneak peek of the Sheps on Ceri's 30th.  You'll have to wait until next time to see the party frock that Nanny Lyn made for Alice. 

Take care all and see you in a week for Father's Day!!!

Matt xx

Happy 30th Ceri/Mummy!!!

Best Friends.....

Did you have a favourite toy when you were little?  When I was a child I used to go everywhere with a hand-knitted rabbit called Funny Bunny who I had hugged so much that every last bit of the stuffing had fallen out of him.  He is probably still slightly warm, damp and smelling of Farley's Rusks as a result of my fossilised baby drool to this day!  Well, at the moment, Ceri and I have no idea who Alice's favourite toy is.  And given that Alice, all of a sudden, has become prone to being a little grizzly of an evening (at a time that all parents seem to refer to - knowingly with a large sigh - as "The Witching Hour") it seems important to know who her best mate is to attempt to calm her down.  To try and work it out, I decided to arrange a competition between two of the early front-runners to see which she preferred.  So, step up to the plate Aunty Lara's entry:  Sophie the Giraffe, and Daddy's entry:  the as yet un-named pink rabbit.  I want to make it clear that the test was fair and conducted in a controlled environment.  No FIFA officials were present, no animals were harmed, and no money changed hands before conclusions were published.  Here are the results:

Candidate 1:  Sophie the Giraffe - Scared the living crap out of Alice!

Candidate 2:  Pink Rabbit - made Alice cry for 30 minutes solid!

Hmmmm.  Not an out-an-out winner yet then!  My verdict is that, on this evidence, Sophie was fractionally less terrifying than my rabbit, so Sophie goes through to the semi-finals.  I will continue to put Alice in the "New Best Friend" lab over the next few days to see who comes out on top.  Next up:  the Eeyore teddy that Nicole brought over vs the Glowing Seahorse that is Hannah's contender!

Speaking of Hannah and Nicole, you will have gathered by the fact that Alice has toys from them that they have been over for a visit to pay homage to our lovely daughter!  Ceri was so excited about the girls arriving that she almost wore the floorboards out in the living room pacing by the window to see if they were coming up the street.  It's also amazing to see the effort that women go to when dressing up to meet their mates....far more so than for boyfriends and husbands.  Now, when I have been to visit friends who have a newborn, I fully expect to see them in their pyjamas at 6pm, with back-combed scruffy hair, bags under their eyes, and baby puke on their shoulders.  By the time Hannah and Nicole came over, I think Alice and Ceri must have tried on at least six outfits each and ended up dressed as if the queen was coming for tea.  Don't believe me, dear reader.  OK, have it your way....seeing is believing:

Mummy gets ready to meet their royal majesties Hannah, Nicole and Simon

Alice dressed for Ladies Day

And here are the girls hanging out together.....

Alice meets Nicole (check out Alice's Jesus-style halo!!)

A hug with Hannah

The girls together...

As you will have gathered from the blog so far, Ceri and I have not taken the sedate, lie in bed with a cup of tea and a chocolate hob nob approach to parenting (although we did end up watching The Apprentice drinking Ovaltine last night).  In fact, we picked up a voicemail from Ceri's uni mate Justine last night saying she was sorry she missed us - we must be down the pub!  Good lord what a reputation poor Alice has!!  Actually, for once, we weren't down the pub (that was the day before).  We were being far more cultural:

Given that Alice has now been alive for over a week Ceri and I thought that it was high time we took her to see the sights and sounds of London (other than boozers).  Here's a short review of the highlights:

First trip on the bus

Feeding the birds in Trafalgar Square

Sightseeing in Picadilly Circus (well, I can see the sights...Alice is covered with a muslin square)

A sing-a-long outside Hamley's

Ladies Who Lunch on Oxford Street

I know what you are thinking...that's all very good, but surely you haven't read the most up-to-date Lonely Planet Guide to London.  Everyone knows that to truly experience the vibrancy, culture, spirit and buzz of London, a trip to the Smoke is not complete without a visit to............

PRIMARK PECKHAM!

Alice in the living hell that is "Primani" Peckham.....

Middle class readers please be assured that we followed government health warnings when visiting Primark Peckham - we were exposed for no more than 30 minutes (although it seemed like a lifetime) and we thoroughly doused in Dettol on our return home.  We also atoned for our sins by having lunch in the infinitely more respectable John Lewis cafe on Oxford Street where we introduced Alice to her Great Uncle Paul, Great Aunt Gill and Second Cousin Sophie.  Here are the snaps.....

A Welsh "Cuch" with Paul, Gill and Sophie.....

Great Uncle Paul thinks that Alice looks just like her Grandcha (or Gruncher) Dave.  I am not sure I can see the resemblance myself.  I think the only way to test the theory is either to get Alice to grow a beard (unlikely) or get Gruncher Dave to dress up in a babygrow.  Looks like there is only one way to settle this one then (and remember, Dave, my folks dressed up as midgets for their grandchildren!!!)

The family line up in height order to form a human staircase in honour of Alice

Before I move on to my five plus one, I must offer an apology to visitors to Ceri's Facebook page.  The observant among you who waded through the 500+ images that almost crashed the internet while being uploaded may have noticed a picture that looked like chicken korma spilled carelessly on a wooden floor.  Now, I made a pledge to myself before starting this blog not to mention poo, wee or sick too often - and I promise to stick to this rule.  I am compelled to note, however, that the first skill we can say with certainty that Alice has perfected is projectile poo-ing.  To get a feel for what we are talking about here, take a look at an advert for the "Nerf Super Soaker" that I was playing with along with Ej and Roo with over the bank holiday.  Imagine this filled with watered down English mustard and you could almost be changing her nappy yourself (although you won't have the stains on your favourite shirt to prove it!!):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUA91lSApwE

Yup, I'm so proud to say that our first-born daughter can currently shit a distance of about 3 feet.  We shall monitor her progress over the months, as one would monitor the build up of Jonathan Edwards in triple-jump distances in the run up to the Olympics, and let you know if any records are broken.  Nice!

Anyway, you've been as patient and obliging as ever.  I think it must be time for your five plus one....

Alice and her proud Daddy

Alice with her gorgeous mummy

Alice after feeding:  the "Sunday Lunch" face

Looking cute

Alice "The Vegas Years" Shepherd.  A loan of an Elvis white rhinestone jumpsuit would be very welcome.....

Friends after all

Well, that's just about it for another day team.  You'll be pleased to hear that I go back to work next week so updates will probably be a little less frequent from then on.  I am sure there are only so many pics even the proudest friends and family can stomach.

Before I go, here is your encoure photo.  Ceri and I woke up this morning and found that Alice had got up in the middle of the night, crawled down to the kitchen, found a pen and some paper and written her first ever note.  Imagine our surprise when we looked down into her cot first thing this morning and saw this.....

So, a very Happy Birthday to Nanny-by-the-Sea.  Little Alice can't wait to see you again soon for a kiss and a hug!

until next time, then........Matt x