Grace is quite a sensitive child and recently went through an extra sensitive time when visiting with people and going out.  As a result I've been a little anxious recently when going out because I'm not sure how she is going to react. So it made my heart extra happy when yesterday she enjoyed her time playing in the sand with Fiona and Ben and today had loads of fun at the Bradshaw's jumping on the trampoline, riding bikes and scooters, drawing and generally just pottering around. She had so much fun today that even though she had a short (but late) afternoon nap, she was sleeping in 5 minutes this evening – Kim we may just come and visit everyday 🙂

We are fragile as parents. We get worn down from things like waking up in the middle of the night, or just the persistent resistance of a two year old. Sometimes it wears us down to the point of snapping, and other times we manage to haul it all back together. When we fall apart we feel guilty and when we get it right we are proud of ourselves.

Grandpa and Grace

Drawing in Grandpa's puzzle book

Each night after Grace has said goodnight to Duncan I go into her room and lie with her for a few minutes.  We usually chat about various things, but the main event is me singing to her.  Currently she requests "Jee – Jesus loves me this I know," followed by "night – for Silent Night" and a new addition to the repertoire is "Gace- for Amazing Grace."  Once I am finished she usually says "one" meaning just one more and she will then choose one of the above songs again – four verses is my limit.

I’m glad we finally got our aquarium annual passes, it means lots of opportunities for Grace to see fish, spider crabs, frogs, penguins and jellyfish, which she thoroughly enjoys.

Snack time at the kelp forest

Well, the little people aren't (they don't even get woken up these days), and neither are puzzles.

It is possible to make a plait if the phone is used as a distraction.

Grace and I were reading a book of words, numbers, shapes and so forth tonight before bed time. We got to the shape page and she points to one and says, “Diamond,” which was the correct shape, and which I did not know she knew how to say or identify. She them went on to say heart, triangle, star, circle and two words which I couldn’t quite recognise for square and rectangle. The crescent is a “moon” and the oval is an “egg.” I was just so surprised that of all the shapes she could have said, she chose to say diamond.

I find it really exciting when she is able to express some of the things that she knows, which we do not know she knows.

Grace really likes her pastels, and enjoys packing them away while saying “tidy.” Just in case it is not obvious, the colouring in the middle is mommy’s creation. The pink table top is still just the primer – we need to find some magnetic paint to put on it before we put the top coat on.

It is probably more often that our children work us up rather than calm us down (or at least that is what we remember), but today I got to be calmed by my daughter.

We have changed Grace's toothpaste recently which means she should now be spitting it out rather than swallowing, so we have been working on spitting….