Sleep, Sleep, my kingdom for some sleep!

by Peter
(Bucharest)

My father in law clearing the snow.

As you may have noticed, there has a been a decidable absence of blog entries of late. This is because life in the Fogarty household has kicked into a new gear.

We are now all working hard to keep little Victor happy - at 16 days all, he is a hard task master, requiring round the clock entertainment.

Irina and Doina are still on the night shift, while I pop in - however as the walls of the apartment at at least 1/2 metre thick and Irina and Doina jump at the first whimper, I am now trying to be more useful in the day time.

The snow came, and went and came back again. Today it was pouring down with snow and so my trip to the book shop to buy some more how to look after a baby Romanian style and also get some Romanian children's music as Irina wants little Victor to also absorb Romanian music into his subconscious.

We got rid of the baby weighing scales and replaced them with a fantastic steriliser - when I say fantastic, it is on one setting - on the 24-hour per day setting, when you open the lid, a huge clod of steam floods the kitchen, so it is still got some design faults...

Of course as this is Romania - exchanging anything does not seem to be so easy. To change items of equal value, I need to go back to the shop, get my original purchase cancelled, and then use the same credit card to put it through the system again so the pharmacy can keep their books correct.

Three weeks at home and I am ready to go back to school - I will use the time each day to write my blog on the underground using a little pocket computer I have. It will mean everyone will keep getting great - up to the minute reports of life here. My aunt is making this blog into a little book so that little Victor will have it in his keep safe box for when he is older, which I think is a fabulous idea.

The gifts have continued to make it here, and so I really hope that the Romanian postal system has got over its glitch at the moment, perhaps it is just around Christmas that things start to go wrong.

As for the Vitamin D issue, thank you for those of you who emailed me, as I have now found every child in France and Switzerland has these supplements, and they don't appear to have any side effects. I will then use them with little Victor, and help him grow.

Victor is feeding so well at the moment that we are moving him onto organic powder milk on top of the breast milk as his weight is not going up as quickly as it should. Then again when I was small, I too was a long, lanky baby, and so I am sure he is just taking after his old dad and that there is nothing to worry about (the Romanians love to worry about everything else is his life, so one less thing is considered a blessing.).

Today's question is this - it is recommended that women drink beer to increase their milk supply - does non-alcoholic beer work, or must it be thick like Guinness? I got a load of beer in to use for this experiment, and of course as it would be rude of me to let Irina drink alone. The other amazing new fact about beer is apparently it boosts the strength of your bones - a perfect replacement for vitamin D for little Victor... (only joking!).

Keep reading and commenting, and I will keep adding when I have time.