2 kids or 3?

It's a big decision and one we probably won't be making for a while, but it's in my head quite a lot. Stick at 2, or go for 3? Before we had any we talked about wanting 3, then after Percy was born we thought maybe 2 would be enough. Hardly anyone sticks at one do they, I wonder why? We never even considered sticking at one, but the two or three debate seems to be a big one. There are a few things that are pretty much decided.

-If one of us (me or Dan) isn't fully onboard with having 3 it's a no.
-If we go for 3, the gap will have to be bigger than last time, at least 3 years.
-3 is the max (unless twins) after 3 we will be taking long lasting, drastic and permanent contraception solutions.

So given these provisos this is the for and against a third baby:

Sticking at 2.

• No more morning sickness, no more stretching my belly, no more doctors choping at my bits to get a baby out.
• In 3 years time Percy will be in school and Eric will qualify for 30 free hours of nursery if I'm working.
• We will fit in a normal car.
• In a couple of years we could go on a family holiday without taking nappies and a travel cot and a pram.
• I'm much more likely to be able to do interesting things with my life, like take a show to Edinburgh, have a slight career change, have a shower in peace.
• If the boys share a room we will still have a spare room.
• I might get to sleep though the night one day soon.
• I could start saving for a pension.
• A newborn and a toddler is really hard, you're basically always ignoring one of them. Before Percy started nursery I am happy to admit I was only just on the edge of coping and mainly not enjoying it. So for now we are paying £68 per week for a day a half of nursery until it becomes free in January. That's why if we did have another the gap would need to be a bit bigger or we'd need to be a lot richer.
• I could wear my full wardrobe again, not just breast feeding friendly cloths.
• It's easier for other families to invite you round when you're a family of four.
• Everything is made for families of 4.
• I have 2 hands, not 3.
• The average cost of raising a child in the uk is £229000!
• It's better for the environment (I'm not that bothered tbh but that is an argument some people like to make).
• No one has to be the middle child. two boys seems like a simpler dynamic than 3 boys or 2 boys and a girl.
• With a sweaty cycling husband, a pukey baby and a potty training toddler we already do and average of one clothes wash a day. I'm not sure I can take more than that. 
• So far I've been lucky enough not to suffer a miscarriage or post natal depression. Both very common and something I've worried about, if I stop now I won't have to experience either.
• I heard it said by more than one person "after your third your body never goes back".
• We went to a church sale once and I bought children's chairs to upcycle, I only got 2.
  
• A bit controversial this one: we've are so lucky to have two healthy lovely boys maybe we should quit while we're ahead.
• The 3rd child could be twins!
• When my sisters have kids I can be in that smug no nappies phase.
• Tory britain and their silly anti-3 child policy.
• If we have a 3rd child they may one day find this blog and feel unloved.

Having a 3rd

My mum with us 3 sisters.

• I'm one of 3 and it just feels like the right number for a family sometimes.
• Two is the most boring number of children you can have. I hope this doesn't offend the many wonderful parents of 2 children, but the parents of 3 mainly seem a bit more fun.
• Screw you Tories!
• Percy is the cutest big brother and he has said he wants "a dog and some sisters"
• I might be able to have a baby at roughly the same time one of my sisters has a baby and be on maternity leave together.
• As someone with 2 sisters it feels weird to have not had a girl, so if we have a 3rd obviously there's a chance I would be mum to a girl. I think I'm ok with being a mum to 3 boys too so it wouldn't be like we're just trying for a girl.
• Chance of having grandchildren greatly increases. I think depending on your age when you have kids there always a good 20% or 30% chance that your child won't have children. Like, they might not want children, or not find a partner, be gay, not be able to have kids, or maybe they go and live in Australia, or they get divorced and don't see their child much, or they die before having kids. You never imagine your child will get divorced or die before having children, but these things are all possibilities. With two kids you've got a good chance of having grandchildren but 3 obviously increases your chances, you'd be quite unlucky to have 3 kids and no grandchildren.
• When I was 8 my parents told me they were having another baby, until this point I never considered that to be a possibility. Most of my friends just had one sibling and so I was really thrilled to have an extra one.
• Being old enough to remember a baby in the family was really cool.
• I feel like you are more likely to regret not having 3 than having 3 because you will know and love the third.

A compomise
We might consider fostering or adoption one day, if we stuck at just two biological children. Probably not adopting a baby, although that sounds like a nice thing to do I would feel a bit mean, because I can't be bothered going through pregnancy and birth again I'm taking a pre-made baby that could have gone to a couple that can't have babies. I think I would be more likely to adopt a more difficult to place 5 year old or whatever.

I think what it all boils down too is the choice between enjoying my 30s, getting back into work, going on a holiday and being more relaxed about money, but maybe feeling a bit of "What if?"

Or: having a difficult decade of a million nappies and 60 times that a baby is teething, but maybe enjoying a new family dynamic, a bit more chaos, a bit more fun, a bit less normal. And eventually reaching a point where they are all in school and we can relax a tiny bit.

I would love to hear your thoughts on this one.

Percy Turns 3

We've just had the most amazing day celebrating Percy's 3rd birthday! I feel a bit emosh. I really wanted it to be special because he spent his first birthday in hospital with pneumonia, and although his second birthday was lovely, it was quite a stressful life stage of being pregnant, trying to buy a house while living with another family, and I had a vomiting bug the day before.

So this year was going to be the "normal" year when we're in our own house as a family of four, doing a nice party with lovely friends. Saturday night was the peak of my stress, with Eric having an unknown illness and jelly just not setting! (btw Hartleys blue sparkly jelly will not set over a layer of Hartleys green regular jelly, and Eric's fine.) It would be so easy to organise a kids party if you didn't have kids slowing you down.

We had a pirate theme. So we decorated the house with Somalian flags and when the children came: locked them up and wrote ransom notes. Just kidding, not that kind of pirate... the friendly imaginary kind! I went a bit mental with the pirate stuff. There was pirate facepainting, pirate tattoos, pirate stickers, pirate bunting, pin the eye patch on the pirate, musical pirates (similar to musical statues) I could go on...

My parents old unwanted charts came in handy and I enjoyed decorating our photos.

I saw some great pass the parcel tactics. Firstly just hold on to the parcel till it's so awkward that someone stops the music; nice one Harriet. Or the best one, join the game at the end when everyone has received sweets and so the only thing left to win is the main prize which then has to go to you; genius Jessica! I asked Percy who won pass the parcel and he said "everyone" so that was nice.

A lot of people came! We have become a family of four since last birthday and so have a lot of our friends, so you only really need two families to have a full house. I think we had 8 families and us!

We didn't have any extended family (too little room, we're having a separate thing for them next weekend) and at the end of the party the God parents (plus Jenn, minus Lydia) came for a more grown up hang out.

Percy was super excited, when he's in a good mood he's the cutest kid ever. An hour after going to bed last night he woke up saying "am I 3 yet?" but when he actually got up and came into our room I sang happy birthday to him and he said "is it my birthday today?" Then he was really excited to see all the pirate decorations everywhere and the cake. He demanded to cut it like they do at weddings.

I loved seeing him open his presents. He's not got to the stage of just opening and then moving on to the next one yet so everything he opened he wanted to play with straight away. which was really nice, and also the reason most of his presents are still unopened. We got him extra bits towards his favourite toys, so extra train track with lots of junctions and an emily train (from Thomas the Tank Engine) and a big Duplo base. He also received from Jenn, a Brio train with batteries, that goes by itself both forward and backward! He went mental for that. We made a simple circle and he just kept making it go forward and then back again and giggling.

He had a slightly strange reaction to Rachel's beautiful hand made elephant. He did a weird noise and when we asked if he was ok he said "the elephant is crying because he misses his family" clever way to manipulate people into knitting more stuff for you Percy. Luckily we found another elephant toy to be his family.

I can't believe we've got a 3 year old. But I'm also genuinely blown away by how many wonderful friends we have and how lucky we are. Considering last year I was pregnant and homeless, I feel so blessed to have a lovely house and a healthy baby. If fact now would be a good time to announce I'm going to have a thanksgiving brunch on November 25th, the Saturday after American Thanksgiving, to raise money for the Whitechapel Centre who work with actual real homeless people, not just people like us who were a bit between houses living with friends.

Happy 3rd Bithday Percy Samuel Jones

Awkward haircuts and trolling

Hey there,

The keen readers/stalkers among you will realise I've had my hair cut. I didn't massively want it cut but Eric pulling it has been annoying. Plus Percy said "mummy your hair looks like a horrible waterfall" what even is a horrible waterfall? I always find having my hair cut socially awkward because I don't know what the etiquette is and what you're supposed to say. When I was growing up my hairdresser was also my driving instructor so he just asked me driving theory questions which was weird but at least not socially awkward.

The hairdresser made it more weird:
I said "I want to get my hair cut short"
Hairdresser: "There are lots of different kinds of short"
Me: "Just do whatever you think, I promise I wont be annoyed"
(She started cutting it)
Hairdresser: "So do you like getting your hair cut?"
I think 'No because its socially awkward'...I knew saying that would make it socially awkward but I didn't know what to say the best I could come up with was:

"Not really, it's a bit of a chore...I suppose it's better than going to the dentist"

The highlight of yesterday was getting a tweet from Marks and Spencer's. Oh and seeing a lovely friend Joy who I haven't seen for 2 years. We once tried smoking dried parsley together, and that is a true mark of friendship.

So Percy got this top as a pass-on from a friend it features gorilla riding a motorbike ...and he had a good question about it:

It's not the first time I've tweeted a company. Twitter trolling is sort of my hobby.

Percy is going to be 3 a week tomorrow, he's going to have a pirate themed party. And Eric is 5 and a half months. He's just got his first tooth and we've started trying him on food. 

Aww they're growing up so quickly...while simultaniously not growing up quickly enough. They're totally adorable but they would be slightly more adorable if Percy learnt to poo in a toilet and Eric learnt to sleep.

This blog was a bit random, sorry.

Next blog will be about the pros and cons of sticking at 2 kids or going for 3.