18 Months and How the Monster Hath Grown (by sarah)

Mary is now 18 months old, she walks though still resorts to crawling when she is tired, she points at animals and says ca' which means cat, she asks for milk both verbally and with baby sign, she climbs on things, pulls plug socket protectors out of the sockets and tries to shove her plastic cutlery in if I take my eyes off her. She can undo straps (in highchairs and prams and car seats), she hits the cats and then hugs them, she throws proper on the floor tantrums, she giggles at the slightest bit of fun and runs up and cuddles you, she does shy eyes at people, she gives me a cheeky grin and then runs away from me, if she is tasting something and I say no she will shove it her mouth and run off before I can take it off of her. She can open doors! She likes to help with the dishwasher and laundary which can be intersting. She says wee wee wee wee to mean she needs her nappy changed but avoids telling me before hand incase I make her sit on the potty. If she uses the potty she likes to put the cover on it and then go so that it is nicer to sit on :/

She throws a wobbly every morning when Jean and Daddy go out so we have taken to going to the park first thing followed by a walk to Mac Donalds for Coffee and fruit bag.

She BITES! Jean didn't and was quiet passive in contrast so this a bit of a suprise - we thought we woould have to stop Jean duffing her up but it is fact more the other way around. She idolises Jean and likes to follow her around everywhere. Jean follows me and the baby follows her - this means mummy can not go to the loo in peace mainly.

She loves music and sings and dances - the biggest suprise being that she lalalalas the Harry Potter theme tune! She will always stop struggling and crying with two songs - one is Gotye Someone that I Used to Know and the other is Cradle of Filths Nanthetamine.

She has a mouth full of teeth though is still cutting the big doubles at the back, she still can't handle moo milk and appears to be a bit iffy with wheat and has exma and pretty much always has the sniffles and a cough but is good natured with it (when not throwing tantrums).

She loves swings and being thrown and twirlled and things - Jean hated all that sort of thing so this is a funner part.

She has her own baby dolly called Baaabeee which she hugs and carries around and that Jean puts nappies on.

She brings me stones and twigs and will always find an escape route out of any enclosed park area as soon as you let her loose! Including gaps in railings that you haven't even seen. She will the wait to see if you've noticed the escape - grin and runa away from you really really FAST!

She responds best to Lojban phrases as she realises these are aimed at her and not Jean as a result anyone who hangs around with us ends up using Lojban phrases.

She loves books but will hit laptops if you are not showing her what you are doing on them.

She will bring you shoes and socks and say shoooo and tap her feet indicating that you should put them on her, she loves playing peek a boo. If she wants to go out she will bring you your shoes too and then her coat and then the push chair. She ill move furniture about with a percistant dragging and pushing to be able to climb up to get things off the sides or open doors.

She is a loving and cheekily fun little Monster she is not half a rogue but a rogue and a half all by her self - I've told Jean this means I have about five rogueies in the house - she just smiles and agrees and then says 'ahhh look at Mary doing x,y and z' - I get a sweet but after the first ten minutes slightly grating commentary on everything the baby is doing.

Mary tries to emmulate the martial arts she has seen practiced which is a little unfortunate and painful as she can brake a hand lock if you are not expecting it!

We love our little monster and am so glad to have her. Jean says it feels like we have always had her but that she is suprising.

Cornbury Sunday 2012 (by sarah)

There are a lot of photos here, just click on any you want to see bigger 🙂 (WARNING lots of CUTE)

Sunday Morning at Cornbury Music Festival loomed large and again I was the first to rise,s o I went to the lovely on site showers and then went and bought Kava Coconut milk from the brilliant site store and began making breakfast and stuff. Jean had instructed me not to run away again as she didn't like me being missing Saturday morning when she woke up!

Though the baby didn't stay over with us again as she is still so chesty she did have a good explore of the campsite 🙂 Whilst her sister decided to roll down the hill in her sleeping bag - this is traditional for camps we are on. Last day come rain or shine she gets to find a hill and roll! This time she was disgruntled as I wouldn't let her go any further and there were spiky plants she was worried she would roll into!

We didn't see the giant rainbow birds again but we did see some Road Rage Grannys ridding their shopping trollies - Jean thinks it might have been the same people just doing a new pretend.

We had a go at Welly Wanging - Alaric almost won me a pair of wellies but the welly skidded half an inch over the line and it had to be the whole welly in the circle 🙁

Mary Mary not quiet a fairy, has lots of flowers you know! She also kept trying to run off with other toddlers which was fine until they got pushy as toddlers do and being small she was being bowled over by babies 3 months her junior!

Alaric really wanted to make a fish as did I but Jean didn't so Al went and made one anyway but just the frame as we didn't want to be taking a gluey drying thing home with us!

I love stilt walkers! This time it was a larger than life Lord who kept trying to join in the Morris Dancing!

Jean has a habit of finding people who will blow bubbles for her - this I found is quadrupled when she has her sister with her!

We still could not find any childrens ear defenders so Jeany did not want to go to near the stages but that didn't stop her and Mary from dancing to the songs!

The girls loved the ribbon maze which Jean had spent large parts of the festival making as she did last year at the festivals!

We liked the Morris Dancers especially as they had girl ones dressed in funky blacks highlighted with different colours and there was a Big Cheese too who actually had a cheese hat 🙂 I had to stop the girls trying to join in, I spotted the symptoms - wiggling and inching forward in the hope mummy and daddy wouldn't notice. But big sticks and stomping feet wouldn't mix well with little girls so I had to be mean!

Mary managed to join in the crafts this year - well painting - with just a little help. Jeany was so excited to be helping Mary to paint!

There was one group of people running the most fantastic kids workshops! This was the Going Native one which Jean loved!

She even made a bow and arrow which she got a bit annoyed with having done actual archery - there was a feather and no knock on the end of the arrow. No arrow rest she could cope with but no knock....

Here is a pic of my family festivaling it 🙂

I ran the sock puppet making so Jean made several - this is her with one of her creations whilst wearing her angry birds hat from Wychwood Festival.

And then after face painting and candyfloss and Jean winning a badge from the Qi elves for her question about recursive acronymes (it was her own question too! I was relieved that it was a different set of people to the ones I'd asked my question off!). It was time to go - with me moaning about a certain Will Young who's lovely voice was mullering once again, one of my favourite songs - warrble warrble - how much warrble? rolls eyes.

Princess Alice and Mary Calvin (by sarah)

It is the schools Queen Jubilee Lunch today and so Jean had to dressed in red, white and blue or as a member of the Royal Family. Being Jean she chose to be a Red, White and Blue Princess. That combined tiredness has made her very much Alice out of Alice In Wonderland. This strange state of affairs was increased by Mary being a mischievious little grump - when ever she wears the little baby grown with tiger cubs on, I can't help but call her Calvin. Especially as in the caffuffle of getting Jean ready for school the baby decided to get down and eat the cat biscuits. On all fours with just her mouth like the cats do :/

So I had a precious little madam and a mischievious little monster this morning!

Here are more pics of Jean:

This has made me realise that Jean's idea of princess is mainly Indian - she loves the Princess out of 80 Days Around the World and wanted to go to school in a sari. But she was happy with this get up in the end though she wasn't happy with the pasta salad me and Daddy had stayed up late to make - mainly as it had spring onions in it :/

Merry Mary (by sarah)

I have a rogue and a half these days and part of me thinks that Jeany is the half and Mary the rogue! She wants to do what everything she sees me doing and this includes microphones 🙂

We have been attempting potty training which has resulted in her asking for the potty being taken too it, sat down on it, when my back is turned she gets up puts the lid down on the bear chair potty and then goes :/

She pretends to bite and then grins cheekily at you. She is very clever about getting what she wants even if you've said no - including my special dairy and soya free chocolate and she knows she's been naughty! The grin is so cheeky it's unbelievable.

She is still only picking at food though and is the snottiest creature ever and the exma is worse which means she still demands hugs for hug amounts of time reducing what I can do during the day. But she laughs and giggles when we have song time and she loves playing musical instruments and 'helping' with cooking and gardening 🙂 She instantly steals Jean's school bag removing the reading book which she then "reads" to us 🙂

Captain Jean Sparra (by sarah)

Today Alaric had to go to London to deal with servers - origonally we were going to go with him and me and the girls were going to head to the Natural History Museum but with the weather being so nice and hot I didn't want to risk having the kids stuck in a car in traffic for like half the day so we stayed here.

We inflated the pirate ship paddling pool Jean got for her forth birthday and spent a good chunk of the morning playing Pirates of the Carrabian with Jean as Captain Jack Sparrow, Mary as Will (as she is the new baby captain) and me as ever other character out of the first three films.

Then I made up stories from the the characters Mary got given as bath toys as a christening present last weekend. So we had Gianty the Giant Squid from the deepest sea trench who went on an adventure to visit a coral reef.

I offered Jean the chance to go to the park and then to Pizza Hut for lunch but she stated she wanted a picnic as Pizza Hut do not have sorrel in their salad. So I made them a picnic with home grown salad 🙂

Which the rabbit instantly joined in with!

I had to take photos before removing and washing salad (I gave him some carrots I'm not mean!)

We then had to come inside as it was too hot and we watched Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and then Shaun the Sheep. Then it was back to the pool and bubble blowing and then colouring in!

Mary wanted to help Jean so I had to get one of Jean's old exercise books and some of the scrubbed out felt tip pens for the baby so she could colour in too 🙂

We then had dinner in the garden, followed by another paddle and then The Wizard of Oz and pop cakes.

Today scores high on the goodness scale 🙂