I have proven the impossible
It is possible for Australians to get sunburned in Scotland. Poor little Iain has red shoulders.
Glen Clova
It wasn't clear, but at least it didn't look like rain was on the way, so we decided on a picnic. We packed the food, a rug, a ball, and drove on into the glen.
We ate by the side of a small river. Strawberries, sandwiches and pasta salad. The boys felt that boyish compulsion to get as close to the water as possible without falling in. We played soccer, then went for a walk.
We walked beside the river, amongst the pines and the ferns, sometimes holding hands, sometimes running and falling over.
On our walk, we spotted three black beetles and climed rocks. We walked back to the car, and coaxed the boys into their seats with promise of ice cream. It worked. We had a wonderful day in the glen.
Today we...
Planted Venus Fly Trap seeds into small pots.
Received a parking ticket for £30 for parking outside our front door.
Had Fiona and Jake come and play.
Then accompanied them to the beach park where they played and indulged in a huge lollypop (note Gussy's new haircut).
After we came home, Gussy fell asleep. And snored. Loudly. Turn volume up for full effect.
Then we had fish and chips for dinner.
Today I found...
...a little blonde haired boy in the kitchen. He had made his own cappacino, by sprinking way too much chocolate powder onto the left over frothed milk from my earlier coffee. He was eating it with a spoon.
Earlier in the morning he sat in the highchair in the kitchen and very carefully parked his matchbox cars in a line on the breakfast bench. He surprised us by practising some colour words. All the cars were black until we told him otherwise, but unusually he repeated some of the other colours after we said them including blue, and red.
I've been avoiding my blog...
...because I got half way through a run down of our trip to Paris (yes back in April), got bored and gave up. I will try and finish it this week.
But at the request of my much missed Sister-In-Law and Mum and Dad Mitchell, I am giving a little update with some pictures of the kids.
Summer has apparently arrived in sometimes sunny Scotland. Although the weather hasn't been too warm so far, I estimate that it's been a lot drier than last year.
Iain is now on holidays from Nursery, and starts school on August 19th, and yes, I intend on bawling my eyes out when the big day arrives. He is looking forward to it, and is very proud of his school uniform, bag, and lunch box.
Gussy is now doing a second day at daycare in the hope it will bring is (very) slow speech on a bit. I'm contemplating trying to toilet train him either in the end of August or start of September, but I am not holding much hope he'll catch on very quickly. Not only will his speech hinder him, but he is steadfast in refusing to do things like that when he doesn't want to.
Iain is doing swimming lessons on Wednesdays, and in August he will also start his first year of Rugby. He has proven himself not to be either very interested or skilled at soccer this year, so Rugby seems much more his thing. I'm sure Craig will be pleased to not have to constantly remind him to not pick up the soccer ball, and that tackling is not allowed. Unlike his brother, Angus seems to show a lot of skill with his feet.
On Saturday we all drove to Glamis castle to play in the park, and wander the grounds.Here are some pictures of the day. If you click on the smaller landscape photos you should get a bigger view.
Saint Andrews
Last Saturday, Mum and I went to Saint Andrews for a girls day out before she left on the Monday. I love Saint Andrews. So much history, shopping, and yummy food in such a small town. From Montrose it's about a 1 hour 15 minute drive through Dundee, then over the Tay Bridge. Here are some shots from the day.
Saint Andrews Cathedral. Ransacked and left to ruin during the Reformation.
The Pens, near the Cathedral.
Me, walking between the cathedral and the castle. With my favourite Oilily bag.
Mum in front of this buidlign which was built in 1642. We had luch near here at the Byre Theatre which was once the old milking shed. We had a bargain two course delicious lunch for £12 per person.
At Saint Andrews Castle they were holding a medievel festival with fighting, stalls and other stuff. Here are two pics from there.
We had a nice day, and even got to do a little shopping in the afternoon.
Blair Drummond Safari Park
On Sunday, we went to Blair Drummond Safari Park, near Stirling for the day.
It was one of the nicest days we've had this year weather wise, so we really got to make the most of our day. Although the key attraction is the animals, the boys were more excited about the prospect of a picnic, a turn in the peddle boats, the sideshow and the petting zoo.
Iain's favourite part of the day was feeding the lama. He is normally a little too frightened to feed large animals like the horses, but with a bit of encouragement from Stuart he was soon feeding the lama his entire cup of animal food.
Gus's favourite part was the sideshow, especially the merry-go-round.
My favourite part of the day was the picnic, and the wonderful close up and personal visit by a mother duck and her many ducklings.
It was about a two hour drive to get there, but it was a wonderful day and well worth the visit.
Hello!
Well, the blog has been sadly neglected of late. We've had a lot happening here.
- We bought our house and moved in mid March, but we didn't have the phone or internet for about three weeks due to faulty lines. Will take some pictures and post them soon.
- My Mum is here visiting. She's been here two weeks, and has nearly another two to go.
- Stuart and I went to Paris for four days on last weekend, and left the kids at home with Mum. The kids were fine and Stuart and I had a great time in Paris.
- Angus had another speech therapy appointment. Again the verdict is that he is very slow, but making progress on his own, and we will reasses at 3 month intervals from now on to see whether he needs some actually therpay.
- Angus said his first full 'made up' sentence this week which was "No, it's my car!". The speech therapist must have some subliminal influence on him, as his speech has taken another step up the past three weeks or so.
- Angus is obsessed with his matchbox cars. He has taken sole ownership of every car in the house likes to spend time lining them up just so.
- Iain did 10 days of swimming lessons over the school holidays and did a great job. He is still able to swim independantly without the floaties, and by the end of his lessons was willingly floating/swimming on his back which is something he hasn't done before.
- Iain is making visits to the Primary School in preparation for his move to P1 after the summer holiday. I'm actually quite concerned he's going to be very bored due to the fact that he is so advanced for his age academically. Not so sure what we can do about that though.
That's it for now. I plan on posting about Paris soon.
Iain is Five
Today was my baby's fifth birthday. Yesterday he received his presents, and had his birthday party. From us he received a brand new bike, a robot, and from my Mum he received some construction toys.
I never realised making cakes took so long. It was 1:30 am on Friday night when I finally finished Iain's robot cake, and crawled into bed. This year we had his birthday party at Jumping Joey's in Arbroath, as his birthday was a little close to our move, to be able to coordinate a party at home.
We invited all the kids from his red group at kindergarten, as well as few from some of the other groups. Iain and all the kids had a wonderful time, and Iain was pleased with his cake. We did have to rescue the cake once from Angus, who had moved a chair and was standing on it to scrape icing of the cake to eat it.
Stuart and I have been reflecting a lot recently about how much Iain has matured over the past six months. Had he been born two days earlier, I would have had to have made a very tough decision whether to send him to school last August or not, and I think in the end my decision would have been no. Academically, yes, he was ready but I worried about him socially. Six months ago his tantrums were not under control, and his listening and cooperating skills were selective. Fast forward six months to now and although he still has his meltdown moments, he has improved out of sight. Had we still been living in Australia he would have started school this past February, and he would have been ready in every way.
I am so proud of Iain. He is polite, caring, and very affectionate. He loves his little brother dearly, and is mostly very patient with him. He goes to bed at night without a problem, sleeps all night, and is growing more and more independant with things such as dressing himself, getting into the car and putting his seatbelt on, and tidying.
At five years old, here are some things about Iain; He is 116 cm tall and weighs 22 kg. He likes to draw pictures of robots and his best friend is Calum from red group at kindergarten. Iain can add and subtract simple numbers, and knows the names and sounds of all the letters of the alphabet. He is beginning to sound out and read simple words such as dog, hat, and sun. He eats Wheatbix or porridge for breakfast, and likes ham and cheese toasted sandwiches for lunch. he likes using the camera, but won't sit still so I can take his photo so I usually have to bribe him with chocolate. His favourite colour is blue, and he likes playing with blocks and lego. Hey Diddle Diddle is his favourite song, and pasta shells is his favourite food.
Today we took his new bike down to the links to give him a lesson....unfortunately we didn't have too much success so we'll have to try again another day. We then played at the beach park for a while before heading home.
Happy birthday my baby, I love you very much.
Disconnect and reconnect
I've been contemplating a similar idea myself for a while, but while blog surfing today, I came upon this most recent post from Rebecca Sower. I'm going to join in on Friday.
Similarly, I think it's a good thing for kids to learn to go without all their battery and electricity operated mind numbing toys, so Thursday is going to be their Disconnect Day from now on.
I'm looking forward to the personal challenge.
