...Taking Baby's first passport photo

Taking photos of Jesse for his first toddler passport was interesting. After sitting still for a few seconds I resorted to waving a biscuit over Sam's head.
Just had to share the outtakes...

...back to work

Just before Jesse's first birthday I returned to work part-time, three days a week. To quote Justin I am loving it! The perfect balance of mummytime and getting to write and work with my fab LLPR girls and great clients again.

Another bonus is that Jesse is thriving spending a day each with his nanny, nonna and Zia Danni. Its so good to see him come home with a new word or skill he has learnt from all these new experiences. I do know how blessed I am we live close enough to our families to be able to do this.

And I get to do Teddy daycare on a Monday so the cousins get to play together. Its not all sunshine and rainbows though....Jesse has also learnt to assert himself but only to me and his dad (temper tantrums ahoy, lucky us!) he's as good as gold for the grandparents and zias, and long may it last.

Here is a photo recap of the last four months:

My hero Sara got married to her fine man Sam at Orchardleigh House. She is my hero because not only does she save lives working stupid hours all the time but she does all this without a cleaner either. It was Jesse's first wedding and he fell in love with the strings...

Rocking nanny's knitwear

So Jesse is walking, talking, saying please and ta, negotiating and tantruming. During bathtime he chucked water over my head and before I could open my eyes he kissed me, little charmer.

Fish face 

Easter egg hunt with friends

Obsessed with Nanny's watering can, carried it around everywhere for days

 He ran up the drive crying 'Daddy' when Sam went to work one Monday, broke my heart 

For nanny's 60th we went to Lime Wood Hotel

 Both the boys want to be a Hearn

This photo reminds me of an old pic of his Zia Danni playing dress up at his age. I need to dig it out and post it.

Messing about on the river

...Badger baiting

Here's a glimpse of my Sunday morning...

We had a tough night from teething so it's great to see Jesse in good spirits. I hope you all are having a quieter, more peaceful Sunday.

...dogs and babies

Jesse's favourite thing is Badger. Shame it's not mutual... ;)

In the early days Badger's nose was put out of place as I had to hold this little screamy thing a lot to my chest to stop him from crying. Badger spent more time on our bed upstairs instead of sitting on me on the sofa. But pretty quickly he accepted Jesse as part of our pack. Helping me change his nappy (not particularly wanted) and stopping him from crying by licking his feet and bark talking at him. 

Now that Jesse can grab his fur, Badger is much more weary of him. Like any mama of furry and furless babes, supervising the baby/ puppy relationship is a daily priority. There are times when Badger brings his toys to Jesse to play and there are times when Badger growls when he sees Jesse approaching because he doesn't want to play.

But whenever Jesse falls over on his unsteady feet, Badger is there to (try and) lick his wounds and distract him from crying by waving a toy. And whenever I put Badger in his crate for eating Jesse's toys, Jesse is the first one there trying to let him out.

We are working on teaching Jesse to respect Badger's space and not to grab his nose...

...four grandsons, three daughters and a nonna

My mother who has three daughters, is now nonna to four grandsons. Not a scrap of pink in sight.

It's funny because when my older sister had our first baby Luca we all couldn't imagine our mum loving any other grandchild as much as him. Boy, were we wrong!

With every grandson she has become even more besotted and our boys just can't get enough of their nonna.

Each one lights up when they see their Italian grandma shrieking at them. And my goodness does she shriek. We are very lucky to have a devoted nonna in their lives.

Although there will always be a special place in her heart for the newest boy, here is my yummy Ted. I reckon its because they can't wriggle away from her cuddles.

Jesse adores his cousins, he looks up to Luca and is already terrorising Brandon.

He seems so taken with little Ted, they babble away together already ignoring us mamas - a sign of things to come...

...playing farmers

On Sunday we took the boy and the pup two miles up the road to a petting farm called Honeybrook.

We got off to a very good start, as we were visiting after 3pm our tickets were half price, babies and pups go free.

The animals all came up to greet Badger, he was quite the popular one, and he himself was very taken with a donkey. Sam warned Jesse that naughty little boys turn into a donk donk while I assured him that his daddy was telling fibs. Killjoy mama.

Here's Jesse squealing back at the piglets.

Just chilling...

PS: No babies were hurt making this photo

...recommending the Blissful Baby Expert

In the early days, Jesse co-slept with us. This was never my plan. The thought of having a baby in my bed frightened me. But when a newborn baby cries so hard that he can't catch his breath you quickly reassess your options.

Breast feeding and sleeping all merged into one. This suited me fine as I actually think i got more sleep that way. But as the months went by it became clear that Jesse was using me as a dummy. In the evenings he would get so restless that he couldn't even get to sleep on me. He was still waking at 3am to breast feed and I had a feeling that it was more for comfort than hunger. 

A friend posted on Facebook about her wonder woman, the Blissful Baby Expert author Lisa Clegg. I asked if her book could help me teach Jesse to go to sleep by himself without using me as a dummy. She said absolutely, and even better than that I could email her direct for help.

That night our attempts of the 'pick up put down' method were proving particularly fruitless - Jesse would cry whether we held him or not so it was more 'pick up and put down 40 mins later once he had exhausted himself'. I emailed Lisa in the wee hours and she got back to me early the next morning to ask me a few questions before advising me on what to do.

After an awful first night for both me and Jesse, Lisa was on hand very early to give me tips to help us adjust and Jesse went to sleep by himself very quickly for his 9am nap. He now goes to sleep in his cot in his own room and can resettle himself back to sleep if he awakes during the night. This is no small part down to having the Blissful Baby Expert on the end of an email giving me the confidence to help my little boy self settle.

No wonder the baby on the front of the book is so happy...

... 101 days and counting

So Jesse is 101 days old today.

He has moved from his moses basket to his cot but is still in our room with us.

He is on to size 3 nappies and at last week's weigh in was 14lbs 12 oz

He has the cheekiest grin in the morning times.

                                               

He loves a good giggle with Patch his dog from Zia Carly and Uncle Charlie.

He has nap time in the pram with Long Neck his giraffe from Karen (daddy named him).

He stares at the colours and snuggles with the blanket from Natasha.

He likes a good thump about on the computer just like his daddy.

He has rolled on his back from his tummy (but we think it was a fluke as he's only done it the once) and he is desperate to sit up. He does these cute little crunches with his little elbows tucked in to let you know he wants up. Thanks for the octopus and the baby-gro now fits him, Amy.

He enjoyed a visit from his little girlfriend Aurelia (Lady A), who was quite taken with Badger.

And Jesse's pretty fond of Badger too.

We just want to thank everyone for his gifts, we have been completely overwhelmed by your generosity and send our love to you all x