Christmas 2011

Wow, what a fantastic two weeks, Christmas with a 19 month old was amazing. C-bear was a little star throughout the whole period, we spent a week at each Grandparents' houses, here are some of the highlights:

Reuben the cat wouldn't get out of his box

 

Beautiful tree at Nana's

We went to a 'live' nativity, it included real-life Roman soldiers, a donkey, sheep and baby!

We LOVED opening our stockings

Made a biscuit Christmas tree (in this photo C is trying to steal the star from the top)

We dressed as an elf (but didn't really get giving out presents to other people)

We made best friends with Reuben the cat (who was surprisingly patient with C)

We got a smart new coat in the sales

We got a new car! It's being delivered in a couple of weeks! Goodbye 3 door Corsa and hello 7 seat Zafira. No more cramped car seat wrangling for us!

So much more, but that's it for now x

Little Reindeer

Playing with the reindeer antlers from Mama's Christmas party!

Bye Bye Little Boots

Can I write a whole post on a pair of welly boots? You bet I can!

C-bear has finally grown out of his first pair of wellies and it makes me feel so sad. These little size 4 boots are yet another item of clothing/pair of shoes that he'll never wear again. I bought them over a year ago, they're from Charlie & Lola and I had to get them for my Charlie as they had his name written all the way round the bottom. So they sat brand new and unworn for about a year, waiting patiently for their little owner's feet to be big enough to fit and then in what seems a blink of an eye he wore them, stomped in them, kicked leaves and jumped in puddles with them and now a short 3 months later they are too tight for his feet.

On Saturday we bought some size 5 froggy wellies which already he loves, has worn inside the house and can't wait to go stomping in the puddles with them.

I'm keeping the Charlie boots, washed and clean back in the drawer. I'm telling myself that's practical for a future brother or sister, but actually I just like to see them in the drawer and remember when his feet were small enough to fit.

Silent Sunday - 11th December

Tell Me About Yourself Award

I've been awarded! Thanks to Mummy Plum for passing this award onto me. The brief is to reveal seven things about yourself and then pass the baton on. I've also been following the trail of the award from blog to blog and I realise I've got a lot of good reveals to live up to. I don't think mine will be quite so revealing as some of them (!!!), but here goes:

1. I'm addicted to gingerbread lattes - I'm supposed to be on a diet, but have convinced myself that because they're only available for a limited time (well 2 months is pretty short...) I have to get one at least twice a week on my way to work. Plus I feel a really sap asking for a skinny decaf latte, so usually bottle out and go for the full fat 300 calorie deliciousness.

2. I love staying in and having the baby is the perfect excuse not to go anywhere. My perfect night is at home with my boys, baby in bed, pizza on way and red wine/beer in hand.

3. On that same theme, I often use C as a perfect excuse to get out of most things I'm not looking forward to, including hen parties, birthdays and all that jazz.

4. I'm HUGELY competitive, I get it from my Dad, but I'm that strange mix of polite English manners and intense, must win at all costs competitiveness. Don't mention Risk in our household, we almost split up over a game...

5. I get really annoyed with the other people using public transport. I can't stand bad manners, if the train is busy (which in London is pretty much every train) then how dare you sit in the aisle seat with your bag on the window seat and tut or roll eyes when I want to sit down. To be honest, if it's pretty busy, I will always get that person to move their bag rather then sit in an empty seat across the aisle. It's PUBLIC transport for and that means you need to share.

6. I'm a massive hot drinks connoisseur, in a similar vein to the GB Lattes, I must have a cup of tea/coffee/peppermint tea/licorice tea/rose tea/decaff coffee/hot chocolate ever hour at work. Luckily my team are similar and we take it in turn for tea runs, of all the teams in the office ours is the one permanently attached to the kettle.

7. I love being a Mum, it's no real secret, it's what my whole blog is about, but some how it feels so right. I didn't realise I was looking for it, but having C-bear meant I faced my 30th feeling like I'd achieved so much! Yes, I know it's biological to ensure human existence, but that warm fuzzy feeling I get when I'm with my little man is one of the best.

I'm passing this award onto Beth at MommaB&BabyBoy - who's recently announced the exciting news of a second baby on the way! I hope you get the time to write yours in between morning sickness - eek!

And here's the list of bloggers I've traced back who've had the Award before me and I'm including my favourite of their reveals:

Mummy Plum - 6. I'm a secret blogger. It's just me, my blog and you; my dear readers. I like it that way.
Trouble Doubled - 4) I like to make out like I'm highly cultured, yet I know exactly what is happening in Coronation Street and Emmerdale right now.
But Why Mummy, Why? - 3. When Butwhydaddywhy had finished putting up Noo’s amazing dolls house I actually did a little girl excited dance… And I may have played with it… Maybe..
Mum2BabyInsomniac - 1. Me and a few of my friends took off down to Newquay one Summer when I was a teenager, we hitched down there and camped on the edge of a cliff. We struggled to eat / drink as we didn’t have any money so we used to go and stand outside clubs and pull guys for a pound. Well I used to snog guys for a pound, my friend used to go and find the guys. I KNOW, I KNOW. You don’t need to say anything but we did used to make £50 a night so it was kind of worth it. Plus had I been in the clubs I probably would have been snogging them for free so at least this way showed business initiative.
motherventing - 1. I am wearing jeans that come up to HERE.
Cinderella Trippin' - 4. My kids have the most gorgeous hands. I can’t get enough of them.
Mama Finch - 5. I once got up at 2:30 AM to go with a friend to a local radio station in order to act like a giddy school girl and see JON BON JOVI! (repeat after me...I'm not a stalker, I'm not a stalker)
(NB. when someones been tagged by more than one blogger I've only followed the first blog mentioned, also at some point this award was meant to be passed to 15 other bloggers, but like Chinese whispers it seems to change each time)

What to do with an ill 19 month old

C-bear has a bad cold, a constantly running nose, hacking cough, on and off temperature etc. I've had the last two days off work to look after him and boy am I exhausted. I'd forgotten what it's like to have the boy on my own all day long, particularly as I've now caught the rotten cold from him! Anyway, here's our sick days in pictures.

We got out the Christmas books and introduced C to Santa Claus

we built towers with the jigsaw, C balanced the fire engine himself!

We painted

We wrapped up warm and had a short walk in the park

We put on Mama's slippers and ate an apple

We napped with most of our toys, 'rudo' and took off our socks before falling asleep

One quick moan, I hate our doctor's appointment system. You can only book same day appointments and have to call at 8am to book one. I phoned at 8am and didn't get through until 8.45am!!! By then all the appointments had gone, so I said what am I supposed to do, I have a sick 19 month old and they were proposing I call back at 8am on Monday (3 full days away) to try for another appointment! Only after I'd made a fuss did the receptionist offer to get a doctor to phone me at some point before midday, and when he did call a couple of hours later, he gave me an appointment at 5.20pm this evening. I also wanted to see the doctor as I'm also ill and my asthma is playing up, but I can't do that until Monday, this evening's appointment is just for the boy. :(

Time

If there's one thing I've learnt over the last 19 months about being a mother is that time just melts away. Where does it go? It seems to disappear completely, weeks, even months go by in fast forward and the little things I used to do without really thinking about it - emailing back a friend, cashing a cheque, writing a blog post - don't seem to get done at all.

In other news, last weekend we went down to Wiltshire to see Mum and Dad, C-bear had a lovely few hours with Granny and Grandad (he wowed all the old ladies at the village Christmas bazaar) whilst Mama and Papa Bear spent a fantastic time going to our wedding venue to discuss menu ideas with the head chef then going out to check out the wedding night hotel we've booked in Lacock. Lacock is a beeeaauutiful village about 20 mins from our wedding venue, the houses date from the 14th - 18th centuries and our hotel is a gorgeous 15th Century Inn. We didn't go inside (didn't want to spoil it) but we walked passed it and it looks every bit as good as when we first saw it online. Then because we had a florist's appointment at 3pm and we had lots of time to kill, we had lunch in the best country pub ever. There was two roaring fires, a Christmas tree, tapestries on the walls and really really good food. I was quite healthy with my choice of a smoked salmon sandwich and soup, but spoiled it by having a chocolate tarte and some of T's brownie for dessert.

This weekend we've seen C-bear's other grandparents, completed all our Christmas shopping (yay) and had a lovely Sunday lunch visiting friends who've just moved to Teddington. Little A was C-bear's first friend and it was lovely seeing our boys together, walking, interacting (by this I mean arguing over toys) and mimicking each other. We had yummy sausages from a local butcher and R gave me the name of someone who made her wedding dress, local to where we live and at a great price.

So all in all a great couple of weeks, but I wish I wasn't so behind on the little things, I wish rather then going to work tomorrow morning, I could spend the day catching up. I love having my boys with me at the weekend, but if there was a magic way to stretch time so I could have a little to myself as well as with my family, then I would be first in the queue to take it up.

And here's a bit of a photo dump from the last couple of weeks:

T having lunch in our lovely country pub

My soup and a sandwich

Plane!!! I can't stop giggling when I see this photo, he stood there for a good minute with his mouth open watching the plane fly over.

Tree! Our favourite tree in the park, C-bear loves to peekaboo round it whenever we go

Bye bye