Things they have said

Big girl: ‘Help, they’re falling on my head’.  The fire works that is!

Small boy: ‘Shhh’ & ‘down’ to the dog.  His very first words after mum, dad and ‘row’ (for row row row your boat obviously).  Oh and ‘dag’ a dutch bye bye.  Truly a bilingual boy and dog whisperer.

ET take two

The little man today farted loudly while sitting at breakfast.  As quick as a flash he gave an enormous smirk and then pointed straight at me, giggling hysterically.  Definitely like his father then, passing the windy blame.

ET

The little man’s favourite game is to point his index finger at you and babble hysterically until you touch your index finger to his in a very ET go home kind of style.  After that moment he whips his finger away and giggles madly.   Hours of endless fun.

The big girl is into sports day.  She watched a Charlie and Lola all about sports day and she is now practising the egg and spoon race repeatedly.  Roll on sports day

Trolly dolly totters

Our bumshuffling baby is really no longer a baby.  At eighteen months he has decided that he is finally up on his feet.

I thought it lovely that he was pushed trolley dolly style in the walker by the big girl until this was all he accepted as a mode of transport except for the speedy bumshuffle.  The trolley was definitely not for walking according to the wee man.  Feet were lovely but not for walking on.  Tickling yes, raspberrying yes, kicking yes …. walking NO.

The visit to Cornwall tipped the balance of our toddling fate.  They have a very battered, very loved horse on wheels which my mum fished out of the cupboard for the little boy and he decided that he would deign to get up on his toes for this.  Off he trotted.

Back up north, he viewed our inferior trolley askance and then bumshuffled off before finally tiptoeing back hauling the trolley in front of him.  Now a trip to the shoe shop has done the trick and off he totters, hand held or trolley pushed.  My baby no more.

Holiday

Me and the two offspring, headed down Cornwall wards to visit family for half term – highlights were seeing an autumn lamb, bike riding and of course ice cream.  We visited a lovely old house and park which is fairly local to my parents.   The fresh air, family time and break away made  it worth even the torcherous  journey down.   Delays and a tetchy wee man resulted in an uber temper tantrum on the floor of airport cafe.  Him, not me, you understand though I did feel like joining him.  The trip back though still delayed was oddly much better, despite the 5.30 am start.

Beginnings

The big girl started school a couple of weeks ago and has been cycling off every morning like a duck to water.  The small boy is grumpily bereft and wiggles with excitement when we get ready to pick her up at the end of the day.   The unpacking of the many, many boxes finally is beginning to come to an end and the house is slowly feeling like home.

The beginnings of autumn are there in the browned leaves and berries after the random sunny hot days.  We somehow seem to have missed our huge blackberry pick this year amid the chaos of moving, a new school,  bidding farewell to my sister and her family in their move to Australia and having family to stay.  A time of beginnings and endings.

Sunny day

I should be sorting stuff out for tomorrow’s work but here I am with a steaming mug of tea looking through the window out into the garden on a sunny day.  The washing is on the line, the wee man is asleep in the pram and the newly acquired puppy is, in turn, asleep between the wheels of the pram.  The big girl has gone off to school happily and full of enthusiasm.  The husband has got through a manic time at work in one piece.  I am still relatively sane.

Life is good in many small ways.

Boxes

Oops, was it really July I last wrote.

In excuse, among many other things, we were about to move about four times over the summer – the perils of being caught between a buyer desperate to buy and a seller doing bugger all to sell and changing her mind on multiple occasions.  But move we did, last Friday.  We now live at Box House,  Box Crescent,  Higher Boxness, Box BO0 0XX.  The big girl and small boy are in box heaven, whereas I am in unboxing purgatory hopefully ascending to box free heaven. And managing to resist not boxing my children’s ears when they tamper with my boxes.

Babble

The small boy mumbles in true northern mumbling style.  He has found his voice and is as chatty as his sister, though not quite as loud.  As yet no one can understand a thing he says.  But the small boy is definitely communicating with a story to tell and questions to ask.  Bilingual babble?  Dutch or English?

In the mornings he and the big girl chatter to each other as they lie in bed and shrieks and giggles come from their room.   The husband and I lie comatosed in bed listening to them and it is lovely to hear so long as it isn’t just when the dawn chorus is beginning.  This morning the big girl took her duvet and collection of favourite toys and camped next to the babe’s cot which took the excitement to a whole new level and along with it a whole new level of noise.

Playing in the rain

The weather has been hot and sultry.  Yesterday afternoon was just brewing for a storm to come and come it did. First the rumblings of thunder and a few flashes of lightning disguised in the clouds, followed by overhead roars and bangs that made the big girl jump and giggle.  Finally there was a deluge of huge rain; big, warm, fat raindrops.  And then it was gone as soon as it had come leaving a steaming road as the water evaporated in the heat.

Once the lightning had passed the big girl was out in the garden.  Leaping in the rain like a mad thing, splashing in the puddles, shrieking with joy, wearing nothing but a huge smile.