Two days, two parties – this one was Teds friends from nursery – our first of many nursery parties I expect
Toddler party mayhem July 5, 2009
Finally posting my pics from the terrible twos party we had for Ted, Ellie, Isla, Zac, Aiden and Josh, also attending were Yvie and Oscar and Matilda ….. it was quite the toddler get together..
Airport antics June 30, 2009
Up early today to go and meet Granny P, Aunty B and Aidy from the airport. All arrived safe and well and after a littel shy time T was having giggles and showing off his sunglasses in no time at all. After a coffee and a catchup we headed back to the carpark with T holding Granny P’s hand all the way (bless). Kisses and cuddles all round before Zana took the newly arrived Perryman contingent home for a day of R&R. T went to nursery and I am at work. Day is flying by. Roll on Thursday when we are meeting up again to see the dinosaurs at the Natural History Museum.
Rental market not looking so good! June 26, 2009
Busy week, but then when is it not?!
T good week at nursery – really developing fast now with words and counting and playing. No fuss in the mornings, in fact sometimes it is hard to drag him away.
Work is … well work, its not fantastic but its ok and its been a not too bad week, although early meeting in Brighton was a bit of a schlep. Ry has some massive presentations next week so is under alot of pressure, ut he is handling it really well, just working really hard.
Home is fine, chores, tidying, takning care of the boys, sleep and then do it all again. Garden needs some attention but not for the next couple of weeks I am afraid
One of the flats is vacant so we are advertising, went in the paper for 2 weeks on a deal which cost – wait for it – £180 pounds, so far have had two calls, one from a prospect who didn’t follow up and one from an estate agent offering an expensive tenant finding service. Last time we advertised this way we had 18 calls in 24 hours …. part of the problem might be the rent as for the last 4 weeks I have been checking and there have not been many flats on then all of a sudden this week there are loads! We are cheap against flats advertised online, but expensive against other private lets in the paper. Will adjust the rent back for the 2nd week – although is only £25.
Upside is I have had to get creative. I have made a classified ad at work on the intranet, found two websites which advertise rentals free, and next week will put notices on the coffee machine notice boards, alot of the contractors look for local flats. Will see how we go.
Good news is that the repayments are currently so low it is the best time for us to carry a void if we have to. Also I got a cheque from one of our other tenants who has been getting behind while waiting for benefits to kick in today clearing 90% of what he owes so thats brilliant.
Today T’s nursery had a summer party which was great fun. Tomorrow there is swimming, and party with Ted and his other 2 year old friends, and Sunday is Eddys party fom nursery.
Most exciting is that Granny P, Aunty B and Cuzzy Aiden are arriving next Tuesday for a 10 day visit so we are all really looking forward to that and going to the airport early on Tuesday for coffee before nursery / work. 4 sleeps for them and 5 for us. Aiden must be sooooooooooooo excited about the big adventure and I know Aunty Z cannot wait either.
Another great weekend June 21, 2009
Saturday was swimming as usual although only Miss Ellie of T’s major pals was there. Emma and I had a good catch up on the weeks events while the kids did their swimming and subsequently ate their full englishes – assisted naturally. They are getting abit like tweedle dum and tweedle dee, whatever one does, the other wants to do to – which does mean they eat a cracking breakfast as T eats all his egg which E resists – until she sees him have it, while she is a bacon fiend – and now T wants all the bacon too – better for my waistline! Post brunch we had 20 mins in the playground before heading home. I stopped off for T’s haircut which went fine – although he was so tired by the time they cut his fringe he kept rubbing his eyes and getting hair in them. As a result of that (and the fact the hairdresser was not very good – he came out looking as if someone had had a go with a blunt knife. Shorter, but not very symmetrical and she seemed to forget to cut the sides.
Home and he slept – and so did I as Friday night was diabolical (up intermittently from 2 until 4) but set an alarm so we both only had and hour and twenty. RY was out to watch the rugby all day so I was flying solo, T and I went to the store for basics (milk, bread, snacks for the babysitter) and then to the pharmacy to get some hairdressing scissors (normal and thinning shears!) I have been meaning to get the latter to trim my own hair and go longer between haircuts so that’s a good thing but it cost me £12 to get some decent ones so I could correct his haircut – that’s six pounds more than the haircut cost! Still I am sure over the years they will pay for themselves. Home and I bribed T with a bag of chocolate buttons and had a go at thinning the sides and trimming up over the ears a little. It was an improvement although there were still issues, but his tolerance was low so I thought it best to wait for another opportunity. If its this much trouble maybe we should get clippers and just give him a number 7 all over! I am abit worried about what that might look like ….
Anyway. I called R to chase him up about coming home in time tog get ready to go out and he called me later from the train about getting a lift from one of the stations nearby as there had not been any trains to Sunbury – so I loaded T in the car with my half made up face and half blow dried hair and set off for the station. I got there, called him and found he had got off at the wrong station – indeed the one station I had asked him to specifically not get off at. By the time I got to him and got home it had taken 45 mins and I was steaming, but determined not to have a row as its so rare that we get to go out that I felt it necessary to suck it up, which I did, which he appreciated.
5 mins later the baby sitter arrived. Ted went totally shy and then very upset, we had talked about Andrea doing bath and bed but the realit was cearly hard to swallow. In the end Andrea and I went downstairs so I could show her a few things and Ry calmed T down and put him in the bath, Andrea was his special carer at nursery in his last class which he has only just left so she knows him really well and I was confident that once we had left she would be able to deal with whatever he decided to throw at her. Ry and I did him into pj’s then said night night and left him fighting Andrea to get out of the bedroom. I texted when we arrived at Bex and Andrea replied to say she had brought him downstairs once we had gone to show him we weren’t there, then sat with him in a chair for five minutes while he calmed down, then took him up for stories and milk and then he went to sleep. He slept until we got back and through the night so I guess although the parting was a trauma it was all fine and I am relieved to be over that milestone and would happily leave him with her again.
Had a lovely time at Bex, food and company were great and it was wonderful to have a night out.
Fathers day dawned at 6 for me when T got up and I sacrificed my lie in for ry since its daddys day. Ted and I had 3 hours of play, Beebies and reading before Ry came down and we had breakfast and talked about the plan for the day. We decided on an outing to the Imperial War Museum which we have been talking about going to for ages, so we got ourselves ready, Ry in the fathers day outfit Teddy bought for him and we headed off to Lambeth. The museum is amazing and after 45 mins or so of containing T around all the vehicles I loaded him in the buggy and walked him until he dozed off. I then spent an hour in the George and Victoria Cross room and going round the secret war exhibit (MI5 and MI6 and Special Ops and so on) The ‘Cross’ room is very humbling and more than one story brought a tear to my eye, real valour and the best of humanity. Ry did the same but also spent some time in the galleries downstairs as he didn’t ready all of them – but it was a quiet place and T was asleep and I found it an hour of reflection which is rare in my days at the moment. Once T woke up we went off to find some lunch and ended up in Richmond. had a lvoely lunch together and then took a walk by the river before getting back for bathtime.
I tackled the remaining dodgy hair elements while T was in the bath, and although the front still looks a little wonky, the shape is better the sides are a million times better and the thinning sheers have softened some of the rather blunt lines the hairdresser had created. T went to bed and I hit the treadmill as I have eaten far too much this weekend. I didn’t even bother to do a weigh in as I would rather have a frugal day tomorrow and have a less disheartening peak on my Wii chart.
Here’s the gallery of the weekend
Times flying June 18, 2009
The week is flying by and I can believe it is Thursday already, Since I am not working tomorrow to me it is feeling like Friday afternoon which is great. Work has been busy and there has been alot to organise at home with lots of parties in June and weekend commitments, a tenant move to plan and advertise – which is only going to make things busier in the next few weeks, Teds nursery move which has gone really well and so on.
T has been great this week, no more tears at nursery and he seems to be settling in well in his new class. His little friend Eddy is moving up soon and Kaity came up yesterday so he isn’t the new boy anymore and his friends are starting to join him. He clocked his head going through the front door this morning – he has a tendancy to ricochet off things and had a wopper of a bruise on his temple, he was a little dazed and I stayed until we were sure he was going to be ok, but he took himself off and sat at his spot for breakfast with no fuss by himself so he must have been fine and I checked at lunchtime and he was napping but they were not worried about him at all.
It was not the best start to the day today when Ted did a wee on our bed and a poo on his bedroom floor! I was dozing in his bed and then heard Ry yell that Ted had done a wee on our bed I sat up to go and deal with that and narrowly missed standing on the poo he had left on the floor! He had removed his nappy and then because we have not done any potty training had decided that he would just go as and where he thought best. Fortunately it was a very tidy little parcel that was easy to dispose of and after stripping the bed it had not gone through to the mattress so no biggy, just alot to deal with at 0630. It might be time to start looking at potty traiing if he is going to take his nappy off – at nursery in his class now there are little loos and pottys so he must be watching other children go.
Other than the ‘poo on the floor’ incident it has been a largely uneventful week and T has been a diamond little chap.
Tomorrow I am off to Bex for nails and chat and to prepare some salads for her party on Saturday – first big night out with non GW babysitter. Fortunately there are staff at the nursery who do babysitting one of which is T’s special carer from his last class, so she is going to sit for us. I feel so much better about this as she is used to his moods and needs and how he naps and cries and so she will know exactly how to handle him and hopefully get him settled to sleep without too much of a headache which has always been my concern before. So if that works well as I said to Ry we might even go to the movies one night, or for dinner spontaneously (like with a days notice) – typically with GW’s schedule we need to book a little further in advance due to her broad and expansive commitments (and 6 other grandchildren!!).
Right, one more hour at work so I best make it count. I have paperwork and chores to do tonight and wanted to ensure I got a blog in to give a little update on our week. Hopefully will get some pics on the weekend for next time.
Search insights June 14, 2009
Just a quickie, its late, I am tired, have had wonderful weekend with lovely weather and time spent with friends and family – and have insufficient time to do it justice, but have just observed when reviewing latest activity on the site that the top rated post at the moment is the one entitled ’swinging’, this is a charming picture of Ted and Guy on the swings, but I have no doubt that its appearence at the top of the list is as a result fo people searching for information on swinging of a less salubrious nature. I have noted in the past people have found my blog using search terms such as ‘granny xxx’, ‘little girls play’ and others which are not really repeatable – not least because they will show up when people search again! This combined with the fact that a video of Ted in the bath, which showed nothing more that the occasional flash of cheek recived 49 hits in less than 24 hours – to provide perspective the others posted at the same time had about 8 each. Suffice to say I have deleted it from you tube and will not be posting anything like it again.
As Ry said to me the other day – there are some very wierd people out there – hopefully they find the site and move on because they quickly establish ti is far too wholesome to fulfill any of their ‘requirements’.
Am hoping for a new top post to emerge soon. Night all.
General chit chat from Mr T June 11, 2009
Teds speech is really coming along – this morning we had cackodile – crocodile of course, butty – dummy (we are trying to move away from mamama), anisss – janice, bumbeees – bumblebees, gock – clock, daydoh – playdoh, macket – market (as in we are taking the pigs to market) normally we take them in a tactor, homash -Thomas (as in tank engine) elmut – helmet. Then there are the words he has down pat – water, juice, car, bike, book, horsey, cake, mummy, daddy, play, open, door, keys, coat, bag, bapple, nana, bickit, gapes, rawberries and booberries, cocklit (?!) and his little phrases – shoes on, not dat, in dere, dis one, yere is (there it is), ware gong and Ted coat (which basically means he want to go with whoever is going out!). Heres a taster
Time flying and its not long before GP and Aunty B arrive June 10, 2009
The days are just flying past in a maelstrom of morning rush, full day at the office / nursery, home for active play – no more Beebies its all playdoh, floor puzzles, books and playing with the farm which is much better for T’s development, although makes my day a little longer, bath,bedtime stories, then running, soup dinner, e-mail and bed by 1 with my book before waking up and doing it al again. My evenings have definitely got shorter as there is less time for blogging and even my Gmail is hard to stay on top of.
Good news is that Ry has booked our big holiday to Cape Town in November – yay – so we have something to look forward to and work towards, and we will be seeing GP and Aunty B and Aiden in just under 3 weeks so there will be time off work then to enjoy some quality family time. Lovely to have the prospect of Aiden and Ted and Guy all together for the first time, and lots of exciting outings planned.
Weekend was good fun even though the weather was rubbish. Ted had swimming, he is doing really well and even though we have taken out a float so he has to swim to keep his head above water he is branching out on his own more and more – although swallowing a little more of the pool!. Saturday afternoon he had a children’s party for Yvie – one of his NCT partners in crime which was great as it was just around the corner, he enjoyed the soft play as always – and the kitchen! We also saw Ben who he has not seen for a year so that was nice to catch up too for him and me.
Sunday we went to see Aunty Z and Uncle P and Guy for lunch and a walk in the park and a play on the swings (pics of the boys to come later). Poor little G was a little under the weather – teeth and a cold we think – but once he and T got playing I think it helped him forget his woes and they played nicely together – Guy was walking around with Teds fireman’s case which had come with us holding not only his fire fighting equipment but also Peppa and friends and the classroom kit so both Grannies came up trumps for the birthday favourites this year 
The boys had a lovely play on the swings and it was good to talk through the impending visit of the Joburg contingent and liaise on which days we might all meet up and so on.
Back to business on Monday and Ted was not pleased about Bumble Bees – he kept pointing at the old door saying ‘In dare, in dare’ but now by today he fussed for a minute and when I left but as soon as I was out of sight he sat down and ate his breakfast and I feel relaxed enough about how he is settling in I have not felt the need to call today (for the first time since he moved up). As I said before when he gets home he is keen to play and play doh is the latest most fun thing to do. He makes a cake, sticks a plastic thing into it then sings happy birthday to himself and blows out his plastic candle – its very sweet, he also loves to sing hokey cokey and horsey horsey – especially if on mine or daddys back so we have lots of fun before going up to the bath.
Sleep has improved since he has moved class he seems to settle quicker and sleep through more often – although he did wake at 3 last night and I ended up on the trundle – but this was for the first time since Saturday so things are getting better.
Diet is going ok, weight is stable but not losing much, although when I run in the week it definitely seems to help and I have not regained any of my hard fought pounds.
So thats it – thats where we are, this weekend there is swimming of course and then potentially Jacques for lunch or dinner on saturday and then off to do something for Joels birthday Sunday with B and L and GW and GPa depending on the weather. If its sunny we might even go to the lido??
