Boat Building, Cake Making, Minions, Fine Dining in Paris & Totem Poles…But Kisses are Most Valued

It seems the routine of back to school has finally been re-established this week with all children having got over their return to school bugs that seem to grace the house with start of new terms, Mila, 4 has taken to full time school like a duck to water & all the others returned like they’ve never been off. I on the other hand am finding the dynamic change within the household a little fast paced with Noah, 17 months & I spending more hours in the day as a solitary couple, it makes me observe his rapid development & transition from baby to toddler a little more carefully & uninterruptedly & his growing up is becoming more apparent from day to day. My highlight by far this week has been the realisation that although he is not able to communicate verbally yet he really does understand lots of things we say to him, he’s a proper little man in his own right and with myself becoming more aware of his understanding I find i’m talking to him in a grown up way & letting him make more of his own choices, these choices in turn fill more of my hours in the day with things that usually get carried out quickly being sometimes painstakingly drawn out, we usually manage the school run in around 15 minutes but a few times this week I’ve let him take his own direction on his little legs and our walk home from school has involved 2 steps forward & then 4 steps back & a few to each side and other directions as he finds something that catches his eye and is off!! He’s become very fond of picking up acorns from a particular spot on our route & I firmly believe he’d make a great squirrel… But above all and by absolutely far my most favourite moment with Noah this week has been his willingness to pucker up & offer kisses at every given moment, he’s quickly learning that its a valuable action to perfect & I’ve taken great joy most days repeatedly cleaning the mirrors in the household that have evidently been subject to his slobbery kissing practices..

We’ve been busy…

Our week started with rain as we set out on Sunday morning with a boat building mission, not to be perturbed by the weather we collected off cuts of wood from our local sawmill, a bag of nails from the builders yard & headed to a lake in the Forest of Dean to set up our own boat builders yard, a pop up tent was our workshop & we made a sign to pin to a tree to alert others to our workspace. The kids hammered away as did the rain but we stuck with it and emerged from our workspace along with a little patch of blue skies to send our sea vessels on their maiden voyages, it was a good day although nearly a week on our wet weather gear & boats still accommodate the footwells of the car…. car cleaning is really not my forte although I found myself quite a dab hand at joinery 🙂

Whilst in the forest we searched for signs of Autumn & returned home with pockets full of autumnal loot, we couldn’t resist playing around with our sharpie marker pens & personalising our treasures. A treasure of our day in the form of a natural family portrait now abides by the t.v….

Us… au natrual

Sponge cakes…

This week also saw some deliciously pleasing to the eye & beautifully sweet cake making within the house, with the aid of old sponges that we had lying about Eden set about with her scissors & little girls imagination to make her own sponge cakes. They turned out delightfully pretty and she was very proud of her pretend baking skills….

I once again turned my hand to healthy hearty breakfasts this week and was so on the ball with school runs and organisation that I found myself sharpie markering our morning eggs alongside my morning brew, having never personally watched Despicable Me the kids were pretty chuffed at my efforts to present them with a few minions… I will get around to watching it one day 🙂

Boiled, soft, hard or alternatively with a smile thrown in….

I also found this week with all children apart from Noah in full time school I had a little time to myself during afternoon naps, I opted not to do obligatory housework (I’d accomplished the basics and everyone had clean pants and food on the table!) and instead filled some of my me time trying to find ways to enhance the little people’s educational activities on their return home, I opted to throw the washing in the drier & make a different use of our pegs with an alphabetic matching wheel using a paper plate, it was used well but I now find myself finding random alphabetical pegs in different locations, mainly underfoot when I least expect it.

Play dates & European traveling…

Thursday we had extra little people in the house with an after school play date, I don’t usually do activities for play dates as I feel it’s a time for the kids to be completely themselves and the importance of being able to play freely & fluently, I believe, is an important part of the kids learning by themselves how to forge relationships, aquire social skills & grow their own imagination and creativity, it’s also a sure way of almost instantaneously turning the house into something resembling an upside down snow globe that’s on a continuos shake motion, EVERYTHING was taken out and rapidly abandoned before moving onto the next target, it was a big clean up operation… I couldn’t resist a little scene setting though so the little ladies were whisked off to dine in style in a Parisian restaurant i’d set up in the kitchen. It was simply a cardboard window with a painted view and a laden coffee table..

Our week finished much the way it had started, outside in the fresh air. We’d found an inner cardboard tube to a roll of carpet on our travels & dragged it home, like you do. With a splash of colour we turned our tube into a totem pole…. I’d decided that I wanted to use our totem pole as a team building exercise so had a plan to not only get the kids to paint the design I had drawn but also have them carry it to the top of a huge hill, together, and place it as the sun set, together, and then roll, throw and drag it back down the hill in the dark, together. We giggled, shouted, pulled pushed & tussled, together……

Our week was a good one, relatively plain sailing & a very pleasant transition into full time school & autumn weather….the colours are rapidly changing in the trees & the kids are flourishing more and more each day, but with the addition of kisses their growth is accepted with a bit more ease…

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