From night 4

Tuesday night was pretty much the same as the previous 2 nights except James struggled with keeping Jack amused and distracting him from wanting my boobs whilst I got some sleep. He also does not want to settle in his moses basket and although he is quite happy to fall asleep on us, as soon as we put him down he starts fussing and I end up feeding him again and again. Very naughtily I ended up dozing off on the sofa with him in my arms but I made sure I was wedged into a set position so there was no chance of me rolling onto him or dropping him. Rachel ended up in our bed again so Monday night was obviously an anomaly!
Wednesday was our first full day just the four, well five, of us getting by without anyone else and with no distraction for Rachel. We decided that maybe we needed to get a fleece blanket for his Moses basket to make it cosier and a bigger cellular blanket to wrap him in.so having looked online and seen that sainsburys do both of these things and they were both on offer we braved the outside world as a family!
We were going to take the pram with the buggy step thing for Rach to stand on but we couldn't work out how to attach it so I suggested we take the sling I had bought in mother care on friday, a few short hours before the waters went, and then could put Rachel in the trolley.

Well the sling is brilliant and I am sure we will get a fair amount of use out of it. I had studied it a lot on the Internet before deciding to buy it and had practised on Friday with rachel's babies so found it surprisingly easy to get it on and get him in to it. It was a bit of a mission to get everyone together and in to the car - with 2 of us this was fine but I am a little bit anxious about how I will cope when there is just me getting everyone together.
(For anyone that's interested the sling is a close baby carrier. It is basically stretch jersey material that crosses over at the front and back and offers really good support to you when you are carrying the little one. They are expensive and I reckon you could make one yourself quite easily but I reckon it will serve us better than the standard carrier we had with Rachel.)
We managed a good trip around sainsburys and got a few bits and pieces including some Brie and pate for me that I love and haven't been able to eat for months!
We then headed home and by this time i was a little tired and starting to get a bit stroppy as I was aching a little and also very hungry!
After lunch and after feeding Jack, James took over the childcare and I went up to bed for a bit. Luckily Rachel was also tired as she had been up at 6.30 and she also had a nap whilst I was out for the count. I woke up all dopey and dazed after a good couple of hours and by this time it was time to start thinking about dinner for everyone. We tried to get Rachel to eat the leftover cottage pie but she was once again getting grizzly and going through that whiney hour that we have most days so it was a bit of a struggle to get her to eat anything. We finally bribed her to eat some of it, with the promise of a trip out after tea as we had missed the postman delivering some parcels and needed to go and collect them from the delivery
office.
After a quick bath Rachel insisted she was ready for bed, so I took her up for the first time since Friday and she then proceeded to demand stories repeatedly, then wanting water, then wanting more stories....finally after about an hour I had just got her settled when James came looking for me. I think he thought I had fallen asleep up there as I had been gone for so long!!

We decided to stick to the same evening routine as we had previously despite the difficulties we had had. But when I came back down at half 1, James was stressed out as he had once again spent the whole time desperately trying to stop Jack from fussing and crying as he was once again wanting my boobs non stop. (I think from tonight we will have to try something else, if only to preserve some of my hubby's sanity!!)

I then spent the best part of the next 3 hours feeding Jack before we dozed off. I actually managed to get him in to the Moses basket for a couple of hours which was a result.

Anyway it was during this time that I decided to start this blog. So, finally, we are almost up to date and I can stop typing furiously and review where we are up to so far.