Natalie's First Steps!

Natalie walked unaided for the first time tonight! We captured this on video a few minutes after the first time she did it.

Davros, Destroyer of the Universe

Natalie Meets a Dragon!

We spent a lovely weekend with our friends Cheryl and Barney, and their son William who is only a month or so older than Natalie. During the day we went to a petting zoo where Natalie was fascinated by the dragons in the reptile house. The dragons were pretty interested in her too!

Natalie face to face with her first dragon

"Can I tickle it under the chin?"

Natalie is out of Hospital

To our huge relief, Natalie is back at home again after her operation, and looking so much happier. Here is a photo to prove it!

Operation and Hospital

I'm sure any parents reading this will understand why the blog has got a bit behind with us having a 6 month old to look after! The past few months have been lovely really, with Natalie starting to smile and babble. All captured on camera and video of course, but not yet uploaded onto the blog I'm afraid. Unfortunately hanging over us during this time has been the looming date for Natalie's operation to fix her cleft palate. Dad is writing this blog entry live from the hospital cafeteria, having come to visit Natalie and Mum after work today. Natalie went into surgery on Monday, and was under the surgeons knife for around 3 hours. Thankfully the operation appears to have gone as planned, but she is not allowed home for at least 3 days. So Mum has been staying with her in hospital, and Dad has been there as much of the time as he can fit around work (who have been very understanding and supportive).

The past couple of days following the operation have been really quite horrible for all of us as Natalie has been in a lot of pain, and not at all her usual self. She went into hospital her happy smiling bouncy self, but came round after the operation very unhappy indeed. It was 24 hours before she really opened her eyes properly again, and when she did it was only for a few minutes (but really lovely to see her look at us again). Now another day on and she actually managed a little smile when Dad arrived to visit her this evening. She has been taken off the strong pain killers today, so she is starting to wake up a bit more now (but fell asleep shortly after Dad got here this evening!).

So hopefully we will be allowed to bring her home tomorrow, and can start to get back to normal. Hopefully as we are resting over the coming long weekend Dad will catch up a bit with the blog!

Natalie's First Wedding

We took Natalie to her first wedding this weekend. It was very windy outside the church, and for some reason we did not get any pictures of her at the reception. But she really enjoyed meeting large crowds of people for the first time.

Natalie meets Matty, another recent addition to our caving club.

Natalie enjoying her first night in a B&B

In the Garden

Just a pleasant day at home in the garden.

Natalie and Mum enjoying the Spring sunshine

Natalie is nice and warm in her thick coat

Natalie likes to feel our faces at the moment

Bath Time

Natalie enjoys her baths, and usually manages to empty half the water out onto the living room floor!

April Fool

Some April fools day pictures of Natalie.

This is a rubber moulded seat which supports Natalie so she can sit up before she has the strength to support her own weight. She enjoys being sat up as you can see.

She also enjoys being in her comfy recliner of course!

She is already developing her computer skills.

Playing Aeroplanes

Natalie loves being whirled around

Playing aeroplanes with Dad

More messy eating, now we are moving on to solids

First time in the snow

While Dad was away caving in Spain over Easter, Natalie and Mum visited Nana and while they were there Natalie got her first experience of snow!

Natalie and Mum in the snow

She seems to be enjoying it

Cousin William playing with Natalie

Natalie is teething

Smiley Girl, Messy Chops

She can be a messy eater, but she enjoys it!

Happy Girl with Teddy Bear

Smiling on the sofa with one of her Teddy Bears

On the Malvern Hills

Spent a weekend visiting Grandma and Granddad, and took Natalie out walking on the Malvern Hills.

Dad, Mum, Natalie and Grandma out walking. Natalie is inside Mum's jacket.

Natalie on the hills

Reading Dad's magazine

Natalie with Grandma

Being fed by Dad

And by Mum too. Must be hungry!

Injections and Weighings

Natalie had her latest set of injections at the doctors today, and was not happy at all. She cried at the first jab, and then with the second one she went into her supersonic silent scream which really pulls at the heart strings! On top of this, she was weighed for the first time in a month (cancelled health visitor appointments and clinics due to schools half term meant we had no chances to get her weighed in the past 4 weeks), and her weight gain was considerably less than expected. Now she might just be destined to be a slim perfectly formed little beauty, but it is a big worry for her parents who do not know if there is anything wrong with her development which might be affecting her growth. She is now in the bottom 2 percent of the average weight range for babies her age, after she had made such good progress from a similar position when she had a lot of catching up to do due to being so premature. We feed her as much as she wants, but don't want to shorten the time between feeds as this just means she needs feeding all the time and takes less at each feed. It doesn't help our worries to have people saying 'Oh, isn't she tiny!', especially all the other Mums at the parent and baby groups whose babies seem to be much bigger. Hopefully in years to come they will all be jealous of our beautiful slim girl!

Smiles All Round

Natalie has developed a lovely smile in recent weeks, and now smiles profusely whenever she gets our attention. This has been a challenge to capture on camera, as she stares with fascination at the lens whenever Dad points the camera at her. But he devised a technique to get around this today. By holding the camera under his chin rather than looking though the view finder, Dad can smile at Natalie and get her attention. Then every time she breaks into a smile he snaps away. Eventually a lovely in-focus picture of a smiling little girl is captured!

Smiling on the sofa for Dad!

Here she is smiling again in the kitchen with Mum

A Walk By The River

The weather was lovely again this Sunday, so we went on a long walk by the river with Natalie and our friends Linda, Richard and Mark. Thanks to them taking some pictures we got some of Natalie with both Mum and Dad, and also had an excuse to go to the pub!

Natalie on the river bank with Mum and Dad

Natalie and Mum reflected in the river

Natalie in the pub with Mum

Dad and Natalie in a comfy chair in the pub

Natalie attempts her first pint of real ale!

Natalie's Friend Mark

Our friends Richard and Linda came to visit again this weekend with their son Mark who is a few weeks older than Natalie.

Linda and Richard with Mark and Natalie

A Walk Among the Snowdrops

After the family get together yesterday, it was another lovely day on the Sunday. So we went for a walk at a nearby manor house which opens the gardens a few times a year for charity. This was the snowdrop open day, and we had a lovely walk round the gardens with our friends Jeremy, Annette and their dog Ben.

Natalie in the baby sling

Among the snowdrops

Mum and Natalie with snowdrops behind

Mum and Natalie in the formal gardens

A Family Gathering

We had quite a gathering this weekend as all of Dad's siblings came to visit, along with Natalie's cousin Frankie. Frankie was born a few weeks after Natalie, but is already quite a bit bigger.

Frankie and Natalie together.


Natalie with Aunty Maria

Uncle Chris with Frankie and Natalie

Aunty Anna holding Frankie, and Mum holding Natalie

We all went for a walk round the village in the afternoon. Here is Natalie in the last sunlight of the day.

We passed this field of cows, silhouetted against the setting sun.

On the Sofa with Dad

Transfixed!

And soon fast asleep

Cousin William

Natalie has been to visit Nana and Granddad. Her cousin William was very excited to see her again.

Winter Walk

We went for our first long walk with Natalie using the sling carrier instead of the pram this weekend. Good job too because we went to explore a local nature reserve where the path consisted of narrow planks of wood crossing a swamp! It would have been impossible with the pram. Natalie seemed to really enjoy it, as did Mum and Dad.

Dad with Natalie in the sling

Dad feeding Natalie in the woods

Mum takes a turn to carry Natalie

Natalie sleeps through half the walk

Mum needs a rest too! We walked several miles and were our for about 4 hours.