Egg Hunting

These are the eggs that we have found so far on the Big Egg Hunt

How many eggs have you found?

Seedlings

In our greenhouse flat lots of things have been growing.

We're heading to the allotment tomorrow to plant some of these things in the earth. And to admire the things that are already growing there.

Woe is us!!

It's been a bit manic for the past week. They say it doesn't rain, it pours. Well when everyone else was being warmed by the sun on Sunday, Kit was being burnt by my parents gas barbeque. It isn't a bad burn (the barbeque had only just been switched on), and in fact Kit was so un-fussed by the whole thing he pointed and said his hand was hurt so that was what we plunged into water (it was actually his arm) and he was off playing on his trike a few minutes later. We were all planning on leaving for the beach when I noticed that he had what looked like a gash across his arm and realised that he had burnt it and the skin had broken. It's taken a few trips to the minor injuries clinic, and a now beloved teddy from a nurse, but he is on the mend.

All the drama (and his uncanny ability to remove dressings) has meant that he missed a settling in afternoon at pre-school, and that his other settling in afternoon he refused to be parted from the teddy - that teddy is with him everywhere now, if he has his face washed I have to wash teddies etc! Thankfully he had a good afternoon there today, no tears, so after Easter hopefully he will be ready to start full time (well 3 days a week 8am-6pm). (When I picked Kit up, another little boy was leaving and pointed at Kit and said to his Mum 'that boy is nice', made me smile, hopefully he'll have a friend there.)

To make everything more challenging, and to explain why I haven't done any of the posts that I was due to this week, I've been feeling fairly rubbish. I'm still a walking snot-factory, and despite having jets of water blasted into my ears, I still can't hear out of one of them.

Oh and Kit has also removed the skin from the tip of his nose having fallen off a trampoline at his childminders.

We are a disaster-zone this week. Looking forward to a new week, hopefully it will be luckier, and I have lots of posts to catch up on.

Take your children to the Tate Modern!

Following on from yesterday's post, we made a discovery at the Tate Modern on Sunday. We already knew about the awesome under-5s section and Kit is a big fan of the slide and the mirrored room that changes colour (so much so he tried to go to sleep in there!).

Did you know that they also now do children's activities in the Clore Learning Room on the ground floor? We didn't, although they may have been doing these for a while. A lovely lady ran through with us a bundle of apparatus that Kit could have to look through, and play with while we walked around the galleries, and then we were pointed in the direction of the room where other people were facilitating the children interacting with the environment. The room was set up with mirrors and lights and a guy who was very patient in trying to pass me objects to get Kit to engage, but Kit was in a running mood so we didn't last in there very long. He did play for a little bit, and I think if it had been a different day then he might have really enjoyed it. It's definitely worth checking out if you are in the area at the weekend.



Mothering Sunday at the Tate Modern

It being Mothering Sunday this weekend I thought that I would force Kit to do something that I wanted to do. I wasn't sure how that would go, since at the moment Kit doesn't seem to be interested in listening to anything that I want him to do, in fact he is excelling in doing the opposite! You might have read my previous posts about my attempts to enlighten Kit with modern art, and his slightly tactile approach to one of the paintings. Not necessarily heading for a quiet and relaxing day to go to the Yayoi Kusama exhibition at the Tate Modern then!

Actually we had lots of fun. I cheated and, as before, kept Kit on his dinosaur rein. I'd love to let him run free, but I'd literally never see him again if that happened (or if I did I'd have to pretend I didn't know him as I wouldn't be able to pay for the damage he would do!). I ended up carrying him a lot of the time though, because they hadn't really set up the exhibition with toddlers in mind, and he wanted to see the pictures too (an art exhibition set up with toddlers in mind would be awesome!).

Apart from one section, which we didn't venture into, the exhibition is actually quite child-friendly. I think it would be great for slightly older kids because she uses such a wide range of media so it would be a really good opportunity to teach them about different ways that they could make art. Kit was most impressed by her singing on the TV, and the flower sculpture on the balcony got a 'Wow!' and was hugely explored.

Magic Beans

Our flat has turned into a greenhouse at the moment. Every windowsill is full of seedlings and I even moved a table to closer to the window so I could fit a bigger propogator on it. We have a lot of tomato and cucumber seedlings, I'm not doing so well on starting my beans. We'll get some of them started later and some will go straight in the allotment without being molly-coddled in the flat first.

I did want to have a bit of fun with some of the beans though, so me and Kit are doing a bit of science on the windowsill too. We've planted some of our broad bean and early runner beans on kitchen roll in jam jars. I did this when Kit was 1, just to see if it actually would work, I didn't learn much because we've managed to over-crowd the jam jars a bit too much, whoops. The runner beans are doing really well though (the broad beans, not so much!).

I think we'll be moving some more of the bigger seedlings to the allotment shed window at the weekend to make some room to start some more bits off. Need to get our potatoes in the ground too.

Trendy Toddler Tuesday

I had said that I would try to do this every week, I failed at the first hurdle! I'm back this week. This week Kit is mastering cheesy poses!

T-shirt - Green Tee Gruffalo Child (bought in the John Lewis sale!)

Trousers - Gap

Shoes - Toms

Cheesy grin - model's own

Check out Very Busy Mama's Blog to see everyone else too.

Running and jumping and climbing trees

Increasingly at the moment I'm realising that I no longer have a baby, or even a toddler, but that I very much have a little boy (well definitely in training). I'm still aware of his limits but he is so determined that he can do things that generally he succeeds.

I spent Sunday afternoon in the playground at Crystal Palace park and I sat while Kit ran. When climbed up to the slide and I didn't feel worried that he would take an accidentally-suicidal leap off the wrong way as he used to. I didn't feel like I needed to be just there to catch him (although I still jumped up to be ready to run just in case!). I could step back and watch him and see how proud he was to acheive new things (like climbing up the more difficult ladder). When we see a tree, he 'needs' to climb it apparently.

It isn't just my trust that he understands not to take the wrong kind of leap that has changed (and there are limits to this as I can't imagine a time at the moment that I will be able to trust him to not run away - he never looks back to see if anyone is behind him and he is fast!). His determination to be independant has meant his ability to do what he wants has improved incredibly. I'm no longer allowed to undress or dress him without permission, as he wants to (and often does) do it himself. On Saturday he got some sauce on the sleeve of his t-shirt, which wasn't acceptable to him. So he took off that t-shirt, went to the drawer in his room, picked a new t-shirt (without leaving a trail of destruction) and he put that on instead.

Silent Sunday

We love to boogie

I've been being exceptionally lazy with my blog recently. To be honest partly I just haven't had anything that exciting to say. All my energy has been focused on coursework, housework, work, and wrestling Kit who is going through a bit of a 'terrible two' stage whereby he generally spends his days doing the opposite of what I ask, throwing things away (or at people) and lying down on the pavement or running away! I just don't have the energy to write when I do have the chance and because I haven't got enough to say I just haven't had the motivation. That said I had meant to write about Fairtrade fortnight and International Women's Day, but hey there is always next year.

Right now I'm just focusing on small pleasures, and blogging when I can.

And my favourite pleasure at the moment is the dance shows that Kit keeps putting on for me, whereby he demands that I sit and watch him dance around on his bed, and then he demands applause afterwards. I think I might have a Billy Elliot on my hands!