uurrrgghhh

I know, I know, where are the Brugge pictures, I will get round to them, damn you. I need to blog today and thats all there is to it.

Since we've been back Leon has added a new definition to the word clingy and refuses to go to sleep (unless in the pram and it's by accident) unless he's on me, preferably feeding. I've tried restricting the feeding but if last night's anything to go by I am now officially a human pacifier. It was awful, from about 1.30 to 3.30 he'd wake, scream like the world was about to end so I'd go in, he'd go quiet, then start up if not picked up and cuddled. I'd try and cuddle him off to sleep, nope, not having that. So I resort to feeding. This up to now, usually works and that's it for the rest of the night, twice at most. But last night, firstly he was wide awake and laughing, then when I got him to relax he laid there awake in my arms, quite happy. I'd try to put him in the cot and sit there with him, back to the world ending. Mostly at night his cries were a 5 or 7/10 but lately it's 10/10 or nothing.

I tried leaving him to cry in his cot while I sat there, more screams. So I pick him up and try to feed him off to sleep, this starts to work but he's not actually asleep and just wants to feed and feed and feed. I'm starting to feel a bit hollowed out and wish I had a dummy I could sneak in. Which is incidentally what I plan to do tonight. He's not into a dummy but I will persist. I will not be the human pacifier for much longer!

I hope this a phase. I've already started to try to train him to go to sleep again by himself in the cot like he did before the holiday but so far he's still screaming at 10 minutes which up to now is my limit for leaving him to cry. I would go longer but it's the 10/10 variety and not the tired 3/5 variety it usually is. I put him down tired this morning later than normal, it started off like he would stop and go off but at about the 5 minute mark it changed up a gear and he screamed the next 5, it was really hard to just listen and watch the clock. After that he fed briefly and conked out for an hour and a half giving me the opportunity to go back to bed and get some kip as well.

He seems more obsessed with breast feeding than ever now, just as I'm thinking of tailing off.

Yesterday morning we watched a little bit of the tellytubbies before lunch, which Leon enjoyed and in the afternoon, after the library and town etc we went to the park for a good swing. After about half an hour the park completely emptied and it was just us so I took advantage of the climbing bit being 100 mile an hour children free to let Leon have a good cruise. Is it my imagination or does Leon look alot like the baby in the sun in the tellytubbies, two teeth and all.

Kangaroo Trikes

I saw one of these in Holland, In about 3 years time...a bit of saving up to do...

http://www.power-to-the-pedal.co.uk/products_kangaroo.htm

Down the coast to Brugge

We left Nieuwegein just before midday and chose to go right round the coast on the road that takes you over all the big bridges and dijks that cut off the north sea from the south west of holland - Zeeland - more sea than land!

It was very interesting to drive through one of the most heavily influenced by man's inginuity areas in the world. During the past couple of weeks the amount of wind farms we've seen has been unprecidented. The area is full of them.

It took a couple of hours longer to get down to Brugge, mostly because we were more using N roads instead of A roads/motorways though Zeeland. We got to the Hotel about 6pm which wasn't bad.

Last day in Holland, time with Mum

It didn't look like we were going to get to spend any time with Mum, which I wasn't really happy about. It turned out that the Thursday afternoon she had some time to spare so we made the most of it and took Leon to a Kinder bouderij - kiddy farm - city farm you know the sort of thing. Leon's too young to do much petting but he did seem to like the animals. Mum got to spend some time with us and her grandson, which as the point of the exercise anyway. We then went to Ijsselstein, to find Leon a new pair or shoes, with no luck. He appears to have very big feet and most of the kiddy shoes in his size are for much older kids with smaller feet. I am going to try the two shoe shops in Ely that so happen to specialise in pre-walking baby shoes so this wasn't so much of a problem. The idea was to let mum contribute by letting her buy them but no matter. We had a nice walk round Ijsselstein, which was lovely. I'd forgotton what a pretty place it is, not really ever having an excuse to go there. Mum knew of the children's shoe shop there that was why we went.

In the evening, Den was leaving on the following day too and wanted to treat us all to a takeaway. Trouble was, from the time the food was ordered to it arriving, he fell on the bottom step, hit his hand and dislocated his finger so they ended up in A&E while the rest of us ate the Indian when it arrived. Den is pretty amazing for 80 odd. we were convinced he'd broken it but not so.

Time to see friends

The family bit was more or less out the way and Chantal was back from holiday so we went to visit her and her family on the Tuesday. It was a lovely afternoon. Sarah had been looking forward to seeing Toby again and was very affectionate towards Leon, a little too much but no harm was done, Chantal is very skilled at keeping her little angels in check. They played all afternoon. It was a great opportunity to let Leon crawl around and play in a kiddie friendly environment, with young kids. We could catch up and chat. We were chilling out and enjoying ourslelves, so much so we didn't take any pictures which is a great shame but I put down to the relaxed nature of the day.

On Wednesday, we picked up Mark from his place in Utrecht and drove out to Slot Zuilen, a small castle just outside Utrecht to the north. Very pretty and ideal for a walk. The weather got better and better as the day progressed and after a look round the castle, lunch there, a walk round the gardens and grounds, we spent the evening on the Vleutenseweg at a fantastic street food restaurant called Peper. The food was all tapas style but world fusion style at a wild stabbing guess, what with me not being an expert. It was really lovley food and one of the cheapest of the restaurants we've ate in on Holiday at that, I'd say the best.

The Efterling

Jan and Maaike were only staying until the tuesday so Monday was the only day we could do the Efterling all together. Mum and Michelle were both working but Nicola could come too which I was glad about. Nigel took the day to wonder round Utrecht, probably thinking now that his kid is bigger, he's done this bit already once.

The efterling is always magic, the weather wasn't great but as a result it was pretty quiet and most rides we could get straight on, and on again, 2, 3, 4, 5 times! I was so looking forward to taking Leon on the Dream Flight. Dream Flight being the word, it sent him to sleep, all fairys and twinkly lights. Maaike did her first roller coaster - the bob, which is a bit like a bobsliegh. It's one of my favorites!

We all took it in turns looking after Leon and going on rides, where ever possible picking stuff he can go on too, there are plenty there, good ones too. We did the photo thing on the Carnaval ride with Leon. There are pictures of Michelle and Nicola at Leon's age on that ride, it's a sort of tradition.

Miffys, the zoo and Mum and John's 25th aniversary

We got to Nieuwegein about 4pm and after dinner there with the family, we were to sleep at a friend's place due to there being so many people staying there - well, Den - John's dad, Jan and Maaike which uses up all the spare space, especially with us needing travel cot space. I was on the one hand really glad to be able to go somewhere a bit more organised than Mum's which is always a bit chaotic but on the other hand, both Tob and I felt a bit rejected. To go so far to visit and then to be in someone's house we've never met was a bit strange. Then there was the 'oh by the way, there's a dog' this was a bit of a worry - an elderly deaf and blind dog with a baby doesn't mix which meant keeping Leon well clear and no messing. Later that evening we met Dawn, our host, who was really lovely and felt a bit better about the whole situation. Talk about extremes though - from the clutter and chaos to a very tidy, roomy place. Neither places in the least bit child friendly but we've coped pretty well all holiday. The only marks on Leon are mozzy bites.

On the Friday we intended to go to the zoo with maaike but the weather was bad so we did the Nijntje (Miffy) Museum in Utrecht instead. This also meant a chance to go to the groene winkel (my old health food haunt) to get some decent baby food and some biodegradable disposable nappies as I'd brought the wrong size with us.

Maaike had a good time at the Nijntje Museum, there's plenty to play and interact with there for little ones in multiple languages. The major ones being Dutch, English and Japanese. There were loads of Japanese tourists there too.

On the Saturday, the weather was better so we went to Amersfoort Zoo. Fantastic place for kids of all ages, the play ground there was amazing, Maaike had a great time, it was as much as we could do to drag her away to look at the animals! There was an enormous circular swing set up with about 5 swings round in a circle so the swings swing in on each other but don't touch. Leon enjoyed the baby swings no end too. It is a very impressive zoo, within minutes of arriving we'd seen bears, a white tiger, rhinos and larger primates among other things. We did the mini train round the zoo, much to Leon's delight (see picture). He sat in the train and took it all in.

In the evening was the party, yes the party. We got tarted up back at Dawns and left Leon in the capable hand of Nigel, Jan's boyfriend. When we got back, Leon was fast asleep in Nicola's arms having cried alot. My instructions about food and milk in the event of such things had been missed in the throng but at least he was asleep. I put him down in the travel cot upstairs and he slept all evening spark out while the party buzzed below him. There were around 100 people at the party, about 10% I knew and most of them I'd babysitted their kids who were now off at university.

The highlight for tobe was the abundance of trifle no doubt about that, possibly mine too although I did enjoy catching up with some of the aforementioned friend of mums. A handful just kept on asking if Leon had woken up yet and couldn't wait to see him. About midnight, he did wake up so I changed him and put him in his night stuff before bringing him down for an introduction to the ladies. He wasn't very sociable, understandably so I took his hint and we left to take him back to Dawn's too put him to bed properly. I didn't see him going back to sleep in the cot upstairs, the noise now in his consciousness. We got back to dawns about 1am, Leon took about 10mins to go off, woke up about 7am for a feed then we all slept in the king size bed until about 10.30. Heerlijk as the Dutch say.