Food poisoning and running nappies

Lara and I had food poisoning on Saturday night (I won't be having smoked salmon for a long time!). Lara barely touched the salmon (if she had any it would be the smallest bite), but still vomitted all night, I was worse with diarrhoea as well. Simon looked after us and didn't get any sleep either. We abandoned our original plan to go to the zoo and recuperated at home on Sunday. The vomitting must have taken a lot out of Lara. She wasn't too happy in daycare on Tuesday and Wednesday, crying, not participating and looking tired.

At about the same time, Sam was teething and therefore not a happy chappy either. He had increasingly running nappies and on-and-off nappy rash. He also started to get up twice a night (1am and 5am), usually because he had done a poo and needed change/feed. During the day, he whinged more and needed more cuddles. I had to pick Sam up from daycare early (2pm as supposed to 5pm) because he had very running poo. I took him to see a doctor that night and collected stool samples for tests on Thursday. After putting Sam on lactose-free formula and no purred fruit from Wednesday night, his bowel movement looks to be back to normal.

Needless to say, I'm exhausted and can't wait for the weekend to come.

[7 months] Crawling, daycare and others

Sam crawled forward 2 days before he was 7 months old (I knew this because I sent Simon an email about it). It was a slow, two-or-three-steps-then-rest sort of crawl, but within a week, Sam could crawl almost as fast as I walked (slowly). Sam is now very good at going back and forth over the step between our lounge and family room and he is trying to stand too! This is how Sam climb over the step- he raises his bottom up in the air, moves his hands and wriggles his bum to go over the step. Samuel spent a lot of time at the step every day!




Samuel knows to wave when you wave at him. He stares at people he doesn't know, really stares. He gets very vocal when he's tired or bored. He doesn't cry very often, but when he cries (usually when he bump his head most recently), lots of big tears rolling down his cheeks. He was crying quite hard in the pram the other day (I was at the Medicare office), that Mother-in-law told me that his ears were filled with tears!

Samuel babbles and tries to say words sometimes. He loves Zebadee(I don't think the reverse is true). He is very inquistive and loves to play balls. He push the ball with his hand then crawls to where the ball is and do that again and again. Like all babies, he's very interested in the things he can't have, like remote control, camera, watches etc. Sam had his first full day at daycare two weeks ago. He's doing one day a week and seemed to be doing very well. He slept for nearly two hours last week but was usually exhausted by the time he came home.



Sam was 9.7 kg on 15th of March (about 7.5 months old). No wonder my back aches sometimes.

Saturday night dinner

two weeks ago - Fried Chicken strips coated with herbs and breadcrumbs. Fried potatoes. Avocado and cucumber salad. Cauliflower & corn with cheese.

I only cooked a couple of times in the last week or two. Mum and Dad are here at the moment, and Mum did most of the cooking. It's great to have help with the kids too!

Sam and Zeb

Sam is fascinated by Zeb. Especially now that Sam is crawling around (quite fast), he won't leave Zeb alone. Zebadee is really very tolerant of Sam.

Spider alert

Simon by chance found the spider near our back-door to be a funnel-web (it had fangs and was very aggressive, attacking the stick simon was holding) thus started the obsessive search for funnel-web burrows. On Sunday within a couple of hours he found and killed 20 spiders. On Monday he pored boiling water into the other spider holes on the ground because apparently that was the best way to destroy their nests. We are on the highest spider alert at the moment - Lara is not allowed in the backyard and I make sure I have closed-toe shoes on when I hang clothes outside. Zebadee is ok as dogs are not affected by spider venom. It's scary to realise that these world's deadliest spiders live so close to us. Simon cleaned outside of the house with a borrowed pressure cleaner ready for the pest spray next week.

While we are on the subject of spiders, there must be a spider nest under or near our car. I saw huge huntsman spider running accorss the front windscreen on at least two separate occasions. I know the spider was outside the car and it's not poisonous, but it didn't stop me from feeling anxious. I have to remember to spray our car regularly too.

Pelicans

Our first encounter with a pelican in The Entrance was when we were having lunch at a cafe. A pelican wandered around the strip of shops in front of the marina, stopping at the cafe. I imagine the shop owner feed the pelican from time to time, otherwise he wouldn't be so insistent in going in. Lara had never seen a pelican this close before therefore was very excited. Even though the food was very average, the pelican and the surrendings made this a nice experience.



We checked into our apartment then walked back to watch the pelican feeding at 3.30pm. It was quite busy considering it was a weekday. Most of the pelicans were waiting in the water and only came up to the feeding platform when their food (raw fish) was there. The same cheeky pelican we saw ealier (I think) was the only one who followed the man with the box of fish around. The feeding lasted maybe 20 minutes. Sam fell asleep in the pram and missed the whole thing. Lara grew a little bored towards the end. The pelicans were not as fascinating to us after three days of looking at them. The marina was full of pelicans and sea gulls at dusk, the noises they made were deafening.

Vera's Garden

If there was one thing that made this a great holiday for Lara, it was Vera's Garden. It is one of the best free entertainment around, on par with the beach. There are plenty of seats around this water playground so parents can sit and supervise or tune out. Lara spent two afternoons here. It's an all-weather kind of entertainment. It drizzled a little on the second day, but it didn't matter because Lara was wet anyway. I imagined we will be taking day trips here next time.