Monthly Archives: October 2012

Buying ballet clothes

Grace has been given various ballet clothes through her life – tutu's, tights, leotards and pumps – but today she got to go and buy her first set of ballet clothes for herself. Tomorrow is her first ballet lesson of the term and she is really excited. It is fascinating how certain things – like ballet – have grabbed her totally. I am looking forward to seeing and hearing how the term goes.

Getting ready to test out the new outfit

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Dancing fun!

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Chilling out with boetie

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Story time for the Drennan clan

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Putting your crocodile in it

School's back, which also means back to swimming, and Grace as usual was excited. No one is sure what happened, but when I collected her from school today she seemed to have hurt herself somehow and was exercising her lungs a bit with a good cry. She settled quickly and off we went to swimming. Grace was fractionally more sensitive when she got in, but was having the usual fun through her lesson until her instructor put her foot in it. There was a little foam crocodile stuck to the wall and as they swam over there she said, "Look, there are crocodiles in the pool." I thought, "Ooh, I hope that is going to be okay," and it seemed to be. They did some monkey walks (moving through the water using hands and the side of the pool) and I noticed Grace stretching as far as she could to move as fast as she could. They started going the other way and suddenly Grace was the traffic jam, making micro moves. And then the tears came….she didn't want to go back that way because of the crocodile. Whoops. And she never really recovered until she got a sticker after swimming and a fizzer from the shop next door. Oh well. Charlene did say that she realised her mistake as she said it.

That's the way it goes when you're having a sensitive day.

The happy dance

Donné bought another Mickey Mouse Clubhouse DVD a while back and it has been sitting in the cupboard waiting for the right occasion…and today was the day. Grace behaved so well this afternoon that Donné decided it was time. She got Grace to close her eyes and put out her hands and when she saw what it was she did a happy dance! She jiggled and wiggled and squeaked with excitement, ran to her brother, did a little dance for him (and explained in her excited squeaky voice why this was so exciting), did some more dancing and was then ready to watch. It was beautiful to see the joy and excitement.

If I were a cat…

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Brother and sister cuddles on the baby gym…or is that a headlock?

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A first!

Today was a big first for me…..a child who slept through an entire nappy change! I was certainly surprised.

Catching some ZZZ's in the garden

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When two of the world's greatest toys – water and sand – come together, all sorts of awesomeness occurs

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Massage time

Before bath time it is massage time, and it's so relaxing I think I'll just keep on dozing

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A short song

When Donné says good night to Grace she always sings her some songs. Part of the new routine is that Eli goes with Donné to say good night to Grace, and today Grace decided they needed three songs – one for each of them. Grace wanted "Raindrops keep falling on my head," and Donné chose "Jesus loves the little children. Grace needed to choose a song for Eli and says, "Eli has a short name, so…..he needs a short song. Ummmm…." After a pause Donné suggested Twinkle Twinkle which made the cut.

We took Eli for a weigh in yesterday. Last week he was 3.35kg and this week he is 3.7kg!

The bath time manager

Bath time with brother, and I’m tickling his toes

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Aw man! Does she really have to squeeze me again?

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One of my colleagues was working here this afternoon and carried on working after the end of my day. I was busy making supper inside and Grace was cruising in and out of the house and playing in the backyard. The granny flat door and security gate were open, so she goes to the door, slides the Trellidor closed and says, “Work Marius, work.” Looks like we have upper management on our hands.

Spice used to love lying on the bump, and seems to think it is a good idea to carry on lying on Eli now that he is out

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Two week wobble

Mom cuddles!

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The two week wobble….it always comes. After two weeks of feeding and sleeping Eli was restless today. He never really settled and hardly slept through the day, but even through that Donné went off on her own with Eli to have a cup of coffee and get a few things from the shops. And now at the end of the day he is peaceful.

Oh dear, what can the matter be

"Oh dear, what can the matter be, Gracie's locked herself in the lavatory. The lock's stuck and now  she's crying, while we wait for someone to open."

Daddy wasn't paying attention and Grace locked the toilet door while we were out today and she wasn't able to open it again (the lock is just hard to turn on that toilet). Normally it is easy to open toilet doors – just use a coin or something to turn the lock from the outside, BUT (a) the lock is hard to turn, and (b) the outside turning part of that lock has been stripped – clearly too many people and children have been locked in there before. Fortunately we managed to get it open with some help from the centre staff and Grace appears to have brushed it off quite quickly. Maybe that will help to insetil the lesson that she should never lock the toilet door.

Grace has been loving holiday school, and our plan was to send her for this week, but let her stay at home on Monday before school starts on Tuesday. With her loving it so much we asked her if she wanted to go on Monday, or stay at home, At first she wanted to say at home, but then after some thought she say, "Go to holiday school. Home is boring." Unfortunately I can't fault her for this statement – school with arts, crafts, other children and playtime is way more fun than daddy working and mommy feeding Eli.

What Eli does in a day

First he gets some sleep.

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Then he pulls some funny faces while sleeping

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His outfit and look changes while he sleeps

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Rough day at the office

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Okay, so he doesn’t actually just sleep all day….but it does make a cute photo sequence 😉