These poor little creatures who we have nurtured for 9 months, keeping them warm, safe, fed nutritiously (although not sure that can be said of mine, I ate & drank rubbish whilst pregnant, anything to combat the morning sickness!)and loved. They then have to go on the most arduous journey of their lives (forget the London Marathon), having their poor little bodies squeezed through a narrow passage. They've learnt to hold their heads up, to control their flailing arms, possibly even turn over, and then the next big thing arrives…

Teething.

There is no other way to describe it but cruel. It's cruel to the baby who is directly suffering the pain & anguish of these little lumps of calcium shredding through their gums, and it's cruel to the parents who are unable to help aside from administering medicine and cuddles. And yes there is the sleep issue, but it pails in comparison to the larger issue.

Baby teeth - courtesy of Babyworld.co.uk

Babyworld has an excellent explanation of the stages of teething, a fab little diagram which illustrates the order of appearance of the twenty teeth which will appear between four months and two years. Yes, I said twenty ! I know! I KNOW! I am wondering if The Boy really needs another eight or if he can just cope with the twelve he's got?

The Boy hasn't had a new tooth in about four months; according to their diagram I can see he's a little behind. We are currently awaiting the arrival of tooth number 13: an upper canine. I wouldn't be surprised is 14 decided to pop along at the same time, just to spite us!

I remember the excitement of the first tooth! One day back in January 2010, a tiny little line of white appeared in his lower gum. Hoorah, something to show for the month of crying & sleeplessness. Wait, not one, but two had appeared! We might get some sleep now! Nooo! It continued and he got the next one a fortnight later, and then three at the same time! Then we were all allowed sleep for a month or two until the molars started to make an appearance. By God, they're nasty!

Fast forward to today and we've had a fortnight of terrible nights where The Boy has ended up coming in with us for part of the night. He is sobbing and screaming in his sleep; I can't even begin to tell you how heart-breaking it is. And you can tell it's bad because he's not even calling us, he's just sobbing so whole-heartedly.

These items are our best friends at the moment. Nooo! We don't use them all together, well not all of them anyway. I think that I've found out that an ibuprofen painkiller and Calgel is most effective for The Boy, but nothing works completely.

And don't forget mums & dads; guidelines recommend brushing baby's teeth as soon as they start to appear (I liked these), especially after the night-time feed. As Jenny points out over on Mummy Mishaps, 40% of children start school with tooth-decay! Get them brushing as soon as they can too, don't let them see it as a chore. My mum bought this for The Boy, it was excellent!

As explained on Hannah's blog, @katetakes5 is, well, taking five from her blog. So Hannah is hosting the Listography in the meantime.

The theme this week is one that I am going to have difficulty with. Not because I am a passive, peaceful, earth mother who never gets wound up. Good lord no! I'm going to have difficulty because there are way too many celebrities who irritate the hell out of me, and I'm sorry but the vast majority of them are the little woman type. You know the ones: they simper up to men, they flick their hair, they are incapable of being a strong independent woman, they have to have a man to look after them! I was brought up to be self-reliant and so they irritate me.

1) Scarlett Johansson.

I absolutely hate and detest her. I cannot even begin to tell you how much she winds me up beyond all comparison to any other person in the world. Especially when I had to endure her in 'He's just not that into you'. Even allowing her name to grace the pages of my blog irritates me. So there is no way that I am putting a picture of her on here, I'd probably break the screen in order to escape her. And no, before you ask, it's not jealousy. Never.

2) Simon Amstell

Snivelling little twerp. He ruined 'Never Mind the Buzzcocks', is rude and pathetic. Go away you little man and never grace my t.v. screen again!

3) Angelina Jolie

I may be slightly jealous of this individual, but my true reason lies in that I loved Brad and Jen, and she ruined it.

4) Katie Price

What is the point of her? I mean seriously?! She's ridiculous. No need to say any more.

5) Kelly Holmes!

Argh! I am sorry I know she won like two gold medals and therefore is a national treasure but no! There are better athletes out there, able-bodied or disabled. Now Tanni-Grey Thompson is a national treasure! But not Dame Holmes! Pah!

See you can tell I was annoyed with the last one, count the exclamation marks.