Grace and mom just having a fun swing together

Eli is a real copy cat at the moment. He likes to see what we’re up to and then follows with his own version.

Reading a book sis? I think I’ll just join you

Sitting on that side of the bath sis? I think I’ll just join you

We help out as a collection point for the Ethical Coop, so on Wednesday we have a passage full of vegetables waiting to be collected. And a box looks a little bit like, well, a stair…and stairs must be climbed, especially if just sitting around in the passage. Fortunately he is light (and we generally make sure he can’t get onto the boxes).

Eli’s jungle gym skills keep evolving and he can now climb the cargo net on his own. He always surprises us with how strong he is and how adept he is at physical activities. It makes leaving the back door open quite tricky, because we need to keep an eye on him and make sure that he is being safe on the jungle gym. Luckily he has started to figure out avoiding the swing while Grace is on it, and mostly he just climbs up the ladder and goes down the slide. We just need to keep our eyes open and make sure we know where he is.

We went to visit another Montessori school today, Bluemoon Montessori in the Southern Suburbs, and Grace again showed herself to be quite at home in a Montessori classroom. She is always drawn to the practical life tasks, and spotted a new one that you suck up some liquid with a dropper and put it into little sections of a tray, and then suck it up again and put it back into the bottle.

They have a lovely big open classroom filled with beautiful Montessori equipment. One thing which they have that our school doesn’t is a set of bells for ringing which Grace spent some time playing. But most of the time Grace played outside in the sandpit and on the jungle gym with the other children.

Jacky (the owner) is lovely and very gentle with the children.

The environment is so different to Newberry Montessori that it is like comparing oranges and pears. Newberry has a massive piece of land on a wine estate, while Bluemoon has much smaller grounds (tiny by comparison). They do have a lovely play area and a beautiful class though. Their primary school is growing each year, and they currently only go up to about age 10, but in two years time they will have a complete primary school.

Auburn House Montessori is full for this year and for next, so they are unfortunately not an option.

Which means it is time for us to decide where we are taking our lives next….

Grace was reading to Eli today, busy going through a book about shapes and colours which she always loved when she was little.

While she is busy trying to read to Eli, he grabs her pony tail and pulls….hard.

She was very upset about this and after calming down a bit says to Eli, “Don’t hurt my body Eli! I’m not going to read to you any more, that’s your consequence.”

We enjoyed breakfast at Jonkershuis with Keren and Nick this morning, and managed to get a rare and half-decent family photo

It doesn’t matter what time it is, how good or bad the weather is, whether they are alone or with a friend – water is just fun…always.

Today was Grace’s turn to do tuck shop at school and she was very excited. In their tuck shop two people bring things to school to sell, and the others buy them and then (typically) eat them. There has been a good amount of activity this week getting things ready.

Sorting the decorations into containers for everyone

Spooning out the icing

Checking out her stores

The final product: cookies with some icing and decorations – ready for cookie decorating fun

Decorating during tuck shop. They do it in pairs, and Isabella brought fruit and sticks so that they could also make their own fruit kebabs

It turned out to be one of their most exciting and fun tuck shop sessions. Well done to Donné and Grace for baking and organising some fun for tuck shop.

Eli got to have his own icing and decorating session at home

Donné says to Eli, “Eli, mommy needs to make a wee.” He jumps up, trots down the passage, goes into the bathroom, and opens the toilet set for her. That’s service!

Eli has been having lots of fun playing peek-a-boo. He hides behind a corner, steps out and says, “Ba!” with the cutest little smile on his face. He also likes to hide behind a book while on the changing mat, and then he slowly peeks over the edge of the book with a glimmer in his eye and says, “Baaaa”, like he is saying boo in slow motion.