Almost there...

... Tadpole is 11 months and 4 days old today. We are so close to the one-year milestone!

Life pre-Nicolas seems so far away now. 11 months ago if I visited Yahoo! Answers I'd go to the Computers & Internet section and look up interesting questions. Now I just go to the Pregnancy & Parenting section and seem to be able to answer any of these questions.

I'm vaguely panicking at the idea of resuming work (2 days in the office, 1 day from home) and having to leave Nico for two days. After a whole year with him, it'll be like re-surfacing to the life of the living. I took him to First Steps Parnell day care and left him with the carers for a little bit while sorting out the paperwork and they returned him to me with tears on his face... I have the feeling that this is going to be a bit harder than I expected.

Geek and petrol head

As you can tell from the tardiness of this post, days with an inquisitive and very fast baby can be incredibly short and unproductive. Add to that the fact that he's grumpy from his cold, and the teething, and my working hours are drastically reduced. Especially since Nico started developing a fetish for my laptop's keyboard. Or the dog/cats' biscuits and water. Or Daddy's already dying pot plant.

Look Mummy, I'm about to cause trouble!

His eczema is playing yoyo, but is kept under control as long as we baste him in creams.

I just can't decide whether I want to ignore that milestone thing or not. So anyway, things Nico is up to:

• Says 'Mama' and 'Dada' to the correct parent. I think so. I hear a lot of Mumumums but I don't know if Daddy gets the equivalent.
  
• Plays patty-cake and peek-a-boo. Not sure what they mean here. He enjoys it when I play peek-a-boo, but I haven't seem him hide behind his hands and do it himself... and he high-fives.
  
• Stands alone for a couple of seconds. I don't think he wants to, Daddy reckons he really likes it when I let go of him and catch him before he falls, so we don't see any real effort to remain standing.
  
• Cruises...
  

Oh, stuff it. I don't like that milestone thing, makes me anxious. Nico's fun, he's cute, he's healthy, and if he's a bit slower, it's because he's a boy and quadrilingual and not surrounded by other kids to learn from, and that's too bad. I'm sure he'll learn all that stuff one day before he reaches his teenage years.

He's helping me tidy away the dominoes by putting them back into their box, then closing the lid. That there are still dominoes outside, or Mummy's fingers are on the way is just a trivial matter. Here's to hoping he will grow up to be a tidier individual than messy me.

Loves the dog (I caught him poking Loki's balls today. Maybe he'll grow up to be a vasectomy surgeon) and Aicha, has a peculiar fixation for Naliah. Dislikes sauerkraut, hates day time napping. Enjoys having his teeth and hair brushed and funnily enough stays still for the nasal aspirator.