Raising small(er) than average kids

So most people I know who have children have something about their child that sets them apart from others - after all, as humans we're all different, right? with us, our kids tend to be small - and by small, I mean waaaay smaller than average - think words like 'petite', and 'runt' and that will give you a nice mental image.

I guess it's something that's been on my mind a lot on and off over the past 3 1/2 years. Probably because to start with, it's the only observation you can make about a baby. I mean, it's what everyone wants to know when they're born, right? how much did they weigh at birth. Afterwards, weight gain is used as a way to gauge how well a baby is doing (or not doing) and it is diligently charted at every checkup from that point. It's used when you want to brag about how well your baby is doing - 'X put on 400 grams last week!' etc etc.

Tim and I seem to produce babies that gain weight super slowly. They start off small and remain small regardless of how much they're fed. Where other babies might make gains of up to 500 grams per week, the biggest gain either of mine ever did was around the 150 gram mark (Vivi actually gained only 20 grams between age 3-4 months). The remarks from the plunket nurse was always the same 'slow but steady gainer', and would make us feel as though we deserved a gold star if one of our kids made a miraculous leap into another percentile line. Always I felt the pressure to 'feed more' that our babies were too thin, too small. In the early days, whenever I took them out and about - and I found this especially with Henry -I would get unwanted comments about his size with one person actually once refusing to believe me that I had a six month old baby ('because he looks like a two month old'). I must admit, it got tiresome always feeling a need to justify the size of my babies and to have to try to think of some reason for their size that would shut the commenters up. Worse still would be those who would hold their huge babies up next to mine and delight in proclaiming how big their kid was compared to mine. I couldn't help but feel that I'd failed as a mother somehow, in not producing a 'bonny baby' with fat rolls and chubby cheeks.

I know that it's just genetics and that you can't do anything about it, but it's still irritating at times. Luckily however, Henry has started to display some absolutely lovely toddler behaviours such as biting and hair pulling that quickly distract people from focusing on how small he is (and who knows, maybe the fact that he looks small and cute is working to his advantage as no one sees his attacks coming!).

A day in the life - Queen's birthday - Monday 2nd June

I'll confess to being a sporadic blog poster at best - but I found myself thinking recently about the idea of illustrating a 'day in the life' and not because any of you are going to find it particularly interesting to read (ok, so I'm obviously thinking 'average' day here, not one where i'm doing something particularly excited like getting kidnapped by pirates - oooh Johnny Depp!) but as a testament to this busy time of my life, a record as to what happened. Because the weeks, months, and years are quickly passing by.

This was our Monday - Queen's birthday - the 2nd of June

The day started off with Vivi climbing into bed with me at 6am, so we snuggled under the covers until around 7am when she decided to run off and get her brother out of his bed. We found Henry (or 'Hick' as she has taken to calling him) laughing away to himself in his bed, pleased to be getting up. I am still thankful every day that he no longer wakes up for the day at 5am!!

7:30am - feeding the cat. One of Vivi's little jobs.

A little boy with a snotty nose, windmills are such fun.

We had to make a trip to the Warehouse today to get Vivi some new shoes (who could resist a 40% off sale) and just because, well, the idea of rattling around a cold house all morning was pretty unbearable! so while I got Henry ready Vivi sat and practised her drawing skills, and writing her name. She can write all the letters but not in the right order yet :)

Dressed now, and practising writing her name.

After an 'exciting' trip to the Warehouse, Upper Hutt that involved a trip to the Pet Store (killed another half hour) we stopped off at my brother and sister in law's place. The kids love Uncle Glen and Aunty Amy, and they live down the road from us which is just awesome. They are always great at entertaining the little ones.

We visited Uncle Glen and Aunty Amy after heading out in the morning. 

What is it with kids and diggers?!

I managed to escape in the afternoon to the 'Armageddon Expo' (I'm a geek). Tim stayed with the kids, they had fun on a digger - roadworks are happening opposite our house at the moment, much to the little ones delight (not so much ours). Armageddon was fantastic, I decided to get my hair done up to look like an elf from LOTR. Tim liked it ;)

LOTR inspired hair.

Then it was time for the usual madness of dinner time. After resorting to a lot of bribery, I got Vivi to eat all her dinner - she got ice cream as a reward, much to Henry's annoyance. So he tried to climb over the table to reach her bowl. My kid's are so well behaved (heavy sarcasm). As you can see, his yoghurt got the better of him, but I'm sure he had fun! (not as much fun as I did cleaning it up).

Lastly, it was crazy time right before bed. But by 7pm both kids were in bed asleep and Tim and I were sitting down to a dinner of Carnitas with the promise of a 'Game of Thrones' episode later. Life is good.