Monster & Teeny

 Monday Back to the vets again for our cat, this time for eye removal (yes that is not a typo!). The children and I walked round our little local town having a quick charity shop trawl where I picked up a couple of exercise videos.

Once home Monster got out the alphabet magnets and sat trying to form words with them on the metal fireguard. He put together I, X and E and asked what it spelt so I said ‘Ixe’ which he realised was the middle sound from Pixar who make all his favourite movies so he set about digging out the P and the R to complete it. OK it wasn’t spelt right as such, it had an E rather than an A but it was ’spelt right’ in terms of sounds. He then decided to spell ‘vets’ and managed that one all by himself, although he wrote it backwards. Then he decided to write a sentence and wanted to write ‘pixar man went to the vets’. He decided to write ‘man’ first and found the ‘m’ and the ‘a’ no problem but we didn’t appear to have a ‘n’ so he used a ‘c’ and turned it on it’s side. Next he wanted to spell ‘went’ and again we were short of letters so he made a ‘w’ and an ‘e’ by getting me to write on paper and sticking them up with magnets but then lost the ability to get the ‘n’ as the next letter. This whole episode must have taken half an hour with the getting of little bits of paper etc and I was actually trying to sort something else out at the same time so unfortunately when he started to get giddy about what sound came after ‘w’ and ‘e’ to make ‘went’ I lost patience and we called it a day. One of those learning curves when retrospectively I should have stopped what I was doing and been more supportive really, but often when I do that he realised just how monumental the steps he is taking are and it scares him into stopping anyway. Ah well, there’ll be a next time.

We then had to collect our cat from the vets and sat in the waiting room for ages reading the books they have in their childrens corner. I think we have now read them all, there is quite a strange and ecclectic mix of literature there which has given us lots of entertainment over the weeks.

Once home again I dug out a game of Set which I’ve had in the house for well over a year having bought it when Jax did a bulk order. I’ve never actually played it with cards before having only ever used the online version so a quick google for the actual rules of play as they appeared to be missing and we were away. Teeny was our dealer, putting another 3 or 6 cards out as and when and Monster, who adores games like spot the difference grasped the idea of the game straight away and really got into it.

Tuesday - a very last minute - as in A came home about 6pm on Monday and said he was working in her home town so would we like to go up with him for the day and visit, an email to check she was free and we were on - trip to Alison for the day. A lovely time had there with the children playing, inside and out while Alison and I barely moved from the kitchen table chatting. We left straight after the children had had some tea and were home both sober and early which is a very big change from a normal day in that company .

Wednesday Was planned to be a trip to a local-ish park with Lucy, R & R but due to threatened bad weather we called it off and they came to us to play for the day instead. Another really nice day with a trip to the local park in the afternoon which Monster rode his bike to and a play in the garden when we got back as the weather had been OK after all. Whilst there I relented from my usual stance of not pushing children on swings - an activity which lost novelty value once they reached about 18 months old and the initial buzz of the delight on the face of a toddler being pushed on a swing had worn off. Also they are both actually capable of swinging without assistance now anyway. But I made a deal with Monster that I would push him for as long as he could count. Now Monster insists he cannot count past 12, although he does know that 13 comes after 12 So I was staggered, and he really earnt his extended swing when with fairly minimal assistance he counted to 100!

Thursday Over to Ali’s for the day which was lovely as ever. The usual playing, drawing, messing about outside, creating things using water and some bonus for Monster X box gaming for the children all of which they thoroughly enjoyed. Ali and I got to chat and catch up and we left very promptly to take out cat back for a post-op check up at the vets.

Friday - A worked from home in the morning which was lovely as it enabled me to go to the supermarket with just one child instead of two and do a load of baking ready to take to the SOTP party in a field weekend. Car packed up we set off around 1.30pm and despite having to use both the M25 and the M1 on Friday afternoon we made fairly decent time and enjoyed a lovely evening with added tent pitching in the near darkness and lots of great company.

Saturday - after a night in the tent it was lovely to enter J&J’s house in the morning for freshly made pancakes for breakfast with loads of our friends. The theme of lovely food, lovely company and lovely scenery continued throughout the day and a fab time was had by all. Some pics here if anyone wants to sit and flick though. Day turned to evening and a second night under canvas, braving rather a windy, rainy night which is actually surprisingly cosy to be camping out in as long as the wind and the rain stays on the outside of the tent!

Sunday Un-pitching the tent in continued wind and rain and enjoying another lovely breakfast before setting about finding all the many things the children had taken into the house and promptly put down again without remembering where they’d left them and we headed for home mid morning. With a stop for lunch and a very slow period around Heathrow airport when the road almost flooded with the sheer volume of rain falling we still made good time getting home again. A very deserved and needed bath and an early night all round