SylkeWeb – Sylke’s mutterings to herself on an island not so far away

Last week our friends Nicola and Stanley and their two year-old son Lucien came to stay with us for several days. They are from South Africa but Stan was on training in Dublin (and took the family along) so the trip over here was short for them. Yannick and I had an absolute ball of a time, it was so fun to walk around Winchester with somebody so much appreciating all the play-grounds, shops, and scenery and not leaving us after a couple of hours. It was like a family visit in the best possible sense.

The kids were kind of playing together with Yannick watching Lucien very closely. He picked up how to jump on the trampoline (even though he still is a bit too short for it) and also tried copying him when getting on his car. Both of them also loved climbing up our play-cube in the garden and going down the slide one after each other in fast succession.

I was also pleasantly surprised that our friends unknown to us had adopted a similar parenting style to ours and that their little boy was far from being the little devil they usually described him to be. He is just a normal curious two year old!

The downer came on Saturday morning at 5am. Yannick had to throw up - and continued doing so at 30 to 60 minute intervals for the next six hours. His facial impression was so full of surprise and disgust. Poor thing, he never had anything like this before. I was so glad that we are still breastfeeding as that meant he would take in fluids without too much hassle, as the boob was the only thing he wanted anyway. He didn't look too happy for the rest of the day either but was definitely better than in the morning. Sunday evening, after our friends had left, the same story started with me. Imagine feeling sick and still having to help your little one sleep by breastfeeding… Not nice, but somehow we managed without getting a screaming baby at night. Then it hit Frank, but he was spared the puking part, he only felt rotten. Frank's constitution is so much better than mine, he was almost back to normal on Tuesday whereas I was still dizzy in the morning and battling with food, simply not feeling like eating anything. However, today is much better and I had a normal breakfast, albeit slowly.

I was so glad that Frank was off work - I really don't think I would have coped without him!!!