Category Archives: writing

TBH

I’m really not in a blogging mood.

We mostly played with Sindy’s today. in a fit of ‘i really wanted one these as a child’, I bought SB a 70′s sindy cooker with grill and lights from ebay – nice and cheap and came really quickly. I was going to stuff it in as an xmas pressie, but forgot about it, so when a parcel arrived this morning, assumed it was a late BB present. Oops, anyway, she/ [we :?))] has/have had great fun with it. I said it was a christmas present she has had early, and hse is happy.

She did a fair bit of mathsy stuff as well. she did the cubes with chris – not sure exactly as SB explained some massively convoluted game to me where I lost the plot. Later, we did sticker subtraction maths together – with bonus sweets to help with the first 5 before all eaten [rofl].

We also read both Hercules and Jason and the argonauts from our usborne cartoon style book. She really likes her greek myths, and def getting the pantheon of greek gods sussed! We looked on the globe where greece was, and Tiryns, colchis, atlas mountains etc. Sb couldn’t wuite understand why Heracles walked to gibraltar and crossed to africa rather than getting a bot, and have to agre with her. Mind you, we decided that the island he went to was maybe one of the canaries, so not in the med anyway. In the book there is a map of the voyage of the argo, and SB a bit grumpy beacuase all the land was white. She says that unless its ice, it shouldn’t be white. So we did a bit on different ways to look at maps with the maps and globes book. Like her mother, she is still sure she is right.

She made a fuss as she wanted a ‘thing’ that she saw at the library. After some delibertion on what this thing was, it was a paper shuffler – no idea of their proper name, but I made a few of the paper shapes I know, including the ‘shuffler’ that i used to play with at school – you know, the thing with numbers and colours that then said something awful inside. It was the right thing, so we undidn it again, had a look at how the squares and triangles were over it, and then coloured and put back together. She is very happy with it, even though it has no messages anywhere!

Other things – well we discussed photos together – looked at Nics baby photos – very cute!! Which led back to a discussion about cords, why they were there etc. And the to us looking at some older ones of SB and her helping decided which ones she liked and we should put up. She doesn’t understand why i tag so much either, but one day she will be a tag convert!!

Other miscellany – playing with BB, she likes the toy radio she got and jigs to that. She has eaten numerous crayons. She can get spoon in mouth without losing all the contents, she has a lovely smile!

Well, TBH, my unwilling blog not so diferent from a willing one, eh! Chris and I slowely returning to land of living – losing migraine makes life bearable again. A cold only is not so awful.

Oh, and the DVLA lost my driving licence application [as moved] and with it, bloody passport!!!!

yay, weekend’s here

but sb not asleep.

Beans had fun at muddlepuddle and then afterwards round at Merry’s. Chris will no doubt blog or edit.

When we all got in, we actually did a lot. I told some stories and then SB and I played a geography game followed by hungry hippos and number 1o number bonds. BB was potterng around playing with musical toys. We then had a lot of fun all together, taking it in turns which child to throw/jiggle and swing.

SB then wanted to write a letter to her friend R in Leeds, and aso drew her a picture. Oh, and she also drew the beans we have growing and their roots – which are the first things to appear. 1 has a long root, one a tiny blip and the other nothing.

No wonder bedtime was so late and she is still awake! I am shatterd as a long and hard week at work. B edtime soon methinks!

The pressure is on

i’ve got to try and blog in the time it takes SB and BB to have their bath – 5 or 10 mins probably!! i’m going out to night, so dressed up, and having a nice meal.

BB a disaster last night, and thought I’d managed a lie in when I got up – 8:30!! Oh well.

Spontaneous learning pre breakfast when SB brought out some getty and dubay to do. practised the V mainly. I would help if she didn’t go off in the wrong direction to start with. We drew as many v things as we could think of. Moved on to drawing and then colouring in the Pudsey bear for nursery. She did a really good drawing – so will flickr it [surprise]. She also wrote her name nicely on the bottom, and then had a dicky fit that her middle name didn’t fit, so turned over the paper and wrote her first 2 names – mirror writing! Even with taking a picture of them both, she just couldn’t see that they were any different. hmm.

After breakfast she watched a Hoobs video, and we did a lot of playing with BB. BB is enjoying trying out the shape sorter – unfortunately the technique of ramming with as much force as possible in nearest hole is not particularly successful, but she was happy with the ‘if you don’t succeed, stuff it through the door at the side’!

While BB was supposed sleeping, Chris and SB made the Xmas cake [and its still cooking!] BB woke up fairly instantly, and squiggled about in the pantry. [SB is down from the bath, naked and soaking- 8 minutes]

I went outside to take some sunny pictures – mainly of pond reflections and fish, and was soon joined by both SB and BB. SB dancing around being a pond fairy, and BB catching up with Josie in the ‘I can now throw myself in’ stakes [she didn't]. SB and I discussed pond reflections, mirrors etc, and what happened when the fish popped up – which the fish did a fair bit as SB threw in about 2 weeks worth of food. So we went back in and had lunch.

More playing with both SB and BB – side by side, as SB didn’t want BB to actually play with her as she was in a convoluted imagination game with elephant finger puppet cat and eagle. BB and I played hammering and beads mostly, and a fair bit of Ta. BB fell asleep, and I read a number of story books to SB, and she read outloud 2 spot books – with assistance on the longer words. We also read the first people by Usborne. Otherwise for maths we have talked about shapes and patterning, and done some counting and finger adding and taking away.

Whilst I cooked tea – nothing exciting, just pasta – SB wrote a letter to Nanny and drew a boat – a normal one on one side, and then turned over to draw an egyption one. It did look a bit like a felucca too. We played memory cards and my bastardised happy families rummy. BB was generally jolly and babbled and fiddled about.

SB now making patterns with the connect 4. Time to feed BB and then go!

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A wooing we shall go.

Well Stringbean anyway, though of course Butterbean does her ‘Smiley chuckle-y baby’ thing to anyone who looks at her for more than a few microseconds :-) On Monday it was the lady in the farm shop, yesterday it was various people – the ‘library ladies’, the lady in the dance shop, in Woolies, in the cafe, in Waitrose…… I think its’ the confident way that she starts up chatting to people, and telling them something in that ‘well it’s important to me so you must be interested’ kind of 4 year old way, and she si always really polite whenever she asks for anything when we are out and about.

So the lady in the dance shop was regaled with tales as soon as we walked in about how Daddy (? !) lost her ballet sock, bemoaning how she had got cold legs in the wind to the assistant in Mackays when we went in to buy some emergency tights, the checkout girl in Superdrug got run down on BB’s teeth as we got toothbrush for her in there. The woman in Wololies got all sorts of things, mostly about her new wellies and how they matched her umbrella, how she wanted a ‘Princess dress’ she saw the various dressing up dresses and has always coveted the Patch of Puddles gilrs for theirs :-). In the cafe she really politly asked for a cake and glass of milk, as well as regaling them with tales of new wellies, toothbrushes, SB being asleep ( ‘ she likes to wake up at night’…)

Ah well it makes out and abouting entertaining.

So what else happened in the last couple of days. Mornings at the moment seem to start for SB with a bit of Cindy/Barbie and dolls house playing, really is into hat at the moment. Need to relocate the Cindy box somewhere else in the room as it is near the door and the entrance just gets littered with Cindy bits. Looked at couple of her science books and made a ‘tin can telephone’, talkeda bit about how the sound travels from one to the other. She had the idea that the sound would travel down the middle of the sting like pipe, but said that wouldn’t work as there was no hole. So we played about a bit and talked about sounds being made / transmitted by vibrations. Sat a read a few of the Usborne Farmyard Tales books, where she made a good stab at quite a few of the words. She doesn’t seem that bothered heself about reading stuff, but if you ask her to do bit she normally likes to have a go. She seems to be in that ‘on the cusp’ of it point at the moment. Did some easy stuff and some writing in one of her workbooky things

After lunch we made a trip out to a local ‘Farm shop’. It’s not really a farm shop – it’s located at local plant nursery. The greenbrocers in the village shut earlier in the summer and then this place opened -possibly in response – they seem to have aqquired the old till from the GG. So far seem ok, I did get some dodgy chestnuts from there last week so she knocked a bit of the bill yesterday.

So we hit the road in the ‘Bean mobile’ – the tandem with trailer attached for BB out the village one way for the Fruit stall at the orchard, where they have good variety of apples, quite a few old ones, that you don’t see often and if you do tend to be expensive, then back through the village to the aforsaid farm shop. Where SB chatted to the lady about BB, insisted we buy things like parsnips and green apples (made a change from today when she kept on about sweets at every turn) and generally did the charming thing. Cycled back home, a tad cold by then, but just enough pedalling to blow out the cobwebs, and SB absolutley loves going out on the tandem.

Home for tea, warming up, a few books and then SB hit the CBeebies website until Helen came back from work (and a rather horrible ‘quick’ visit to Tescos on the way home)

Helen made a nice Beetroot Rissoto for tea (she had it in a restaurant once), SB turned nose up at first, but then ate it all once she was fed it :rolls:

Tuesday

‘Library day’, which somehow, after we have breakfasted, dressed, located all the books, faffed about etc. always seems to take up the morning until it’s time to go out. SB did the aforesaid wooing, listened to story time (much the biggest there now as all the others her age are now in school). BB sat and watched/listened for quite a bit as well, had to be prised, along with couple of other girls from the sticking and colouring afterwards :-)

Home, BB to nap, reading library books with SB, lunch out for the above shopping and wooing which took up the rest of the day. Noticed that SB can spend ages looking at books etc. by herself, I do wonder if she is trying to read some of the words to herself? but probably not :-) Had mean to make the Christmas cake but didn’t get round to it. It takes about 4 hours to cook so one for the morning I think.