Hobbies and pastimes

Heavily influenced by the folk festival and Daddy's musical indoctrination Al is really into singing and playing his guitar. In fact we are the nightmare parents who wheel their child prodigy out to perform whenever we have guests. Al proudly strums his plastic orange guitar and sings his favourite hits for whoever will listen. These favourite hits currently include Baa Baa Black Sheep, Twinkle Twinkle, This Old Man and Billy Bragg's The Beach is Free.

Again heavily influenced by Daddy, Al is now the proud owner of his first Bristol Rovers "football-baller" shirt. The day the parcel arrived with matching tops for Al and Daddy it was hard to say which of them was the most excited.

Al's other latest pastime, which so far is rather less successful than the guitar, is the potty. We've had it sitting in our lounge for months and from time to time Al will decide to sit on it (usually if there's a few people in the room and he thinks he might get some praise for it). He's more keen on sitting on the loo, usually when we're in the middle of a shopping centre or somewhere else equally inconvenient. Up to now whenever he does sit on the loo or a potty and we ask if he's going to do a wee he responds with "No, I'm just patending" ... we could be buying him nappies for quite some time yet.

Gran's 90th Birthday and Uncle Gareth's wedding

Two big family events this autumn. First was Gran's 90th birthday party. About 80 people came including Gran's niece and most of her family from the West Midlands. Here we all are together for the first time in decades - 4 generations.

And here's the birthday girl with Al and Grandma. The party was great fun and Daddy did a slideshow of Gran's life - the first 90 years.


Al loved Gareth and Emma's wedding, not least because he got to wear a suit for the first time, which made him very proud. Here he is with Daddy and Grandad, all dressed up. Al was particularly interested in the fact that his suit trousers had flies for the first time ... and he can tell you exactly what they are for!


And here is a photo of the happy couple together with Auntie Pat and Uncle David.

Summer events

Mummy hit 40 this summer so we had another party in the garden complete with bouncy castle once again. It was a fab day with friends coming from all around. The weather was gorgeous, despite the BBC's prophecies of doom and rain. We hardly got any pics but here's one of Al and Katie whispering to each other.







Al attended his 3rd folk festival - not bad for a 2 year old. He was particularly impressed this year with the chocolate and banana pancakes from the crepe stall, and with Billy Bragg who played on the Friday and Saturday nights. Bizarrely, despite being a highlight of the weekend for Al, BB actually played late in the evening both times, after Al had been delivered back to the babysitter's so he never did really get to see him. Maybe he just felt like he did because Daddy, Al and Annie wore their BB t-shirts all day, as you can (almost) see in this picture. Note too the dragon face paint from the children's activities.


We made a few visits across the road to the Maize maze this summer. We didn't go in to the actual maze once but had lots of fun with the children's activities, including toy tractors to ride on, animals to see and a real tractor ride around the farm. Here's Daddy and Al on the go-karts.



We had a holiday in Wales with friends from church. The best thing for Al (which he is STILL talking about) was the water wheel at Aberdulais. Here he is posing in front of it. He enjoyed the beach again although the weather wasn't really warm enough to actually go for a dip.

A couple more summer photos... firstly Al and Thomas in the paddling pool having fun, then Al with his tiger face from our village summer fair.

Al the handyman - gardening and carwashing

We're training our boy up to do lots of jobs around the home, although we've stopped short of sending him up the chimney so far. Here he is with Johnny doing a spot of gardening.



And here he is again helping Daddy clean the car. As Daddy put it, you start out doing a job with Al helping, and end up doing the job DESPITE Al helping.

Al's 2nd birthday

We celebrated Al's 2nd birthday with a party in our back garden - joint with Joanna who turned 2 a couple of days before. We had a bouncy castle and bubble machine and good company, as well as a Bob the Builder cake for Al and an Upsy Daisy cake for Joanna.




















On his actual birthday we met Nish, Anish and Aralia in Waitrose cafe for a birthday tea. It's where anyone who's anyone goes to celebrate, you know.

Holiday by the sea

We decided not to go far for our holiday this year as it would be the first with our two littlies. So we literally went up the road that runs along the end of our street as far as the coast. We had a lovely cottage in Norfolk and explored the area. It gave Al a chance to wear his "sea pyjamas" even though he wouldn't actually go in the sea this year.

The holiday kicked off to a great start when Boogie Pete from Cbeebies came to our village hall! We can't stick the photo of Al having a cuggle with BP because of copyright or something but he had an absolute ball and still talks about the time he cuggled BP and BP's green t-shirt!

Other highlights of the holiday were spending time on the beach, visiting Pensthorpe nature reserve which was then featured on Cbeebies Springwatch, going on a steam train at Sheringham, seeing a windmill up close and going round an old workhouse with a working farm at Gressenhall. As lots of the holiday covered Al's interest in animals and trains, all in all it was a good week. The cottage owners lived next door and have a huge dog called Ollie who made friends with Al immediately.

Church weekend away at The Pleasaunce

Fun weekend ... Al really enjoyed being by the sea and also the novelty of having all his mates from church around for 48 hours. He especially seemed to enjoy the Sing-a-long Sound of Music and sharing a room with Mummy, Daddy and Annie. Can't say Mummy and Daddy were too excited at the prospect of all 4 of us being in one room but it worked out fine.

Amamals

Al's big passions are trains, singing and "amamals" (you know, like horses and tigers). Here he is when we were at Big Nanny's in Bristol and went to visit Horse World.

Al has now decided that Annie and Nanny have the same name so the best way to tell the difference is to take the example of Big Cook Little Cook on Cbeebies and call them Big Nanny and Little Nanny. Not sure Clive's mum would take being called Big anything by anyone other than her grandson!

Meet the "Haman"

It's been a while since we last had any snow to speak of, but on Easter Sunday we had enough in our garden to make a snowman ... which has certainly been worth speaking of, over and over! Al was very impressed with his "Haman" and spent the next few days checking out of the landing window each time he woke up to see if it was still there. Of course it didn't last long but even after the snowman's demise Al was still pointing out of the window and shouting "Haman, haman".

Daddy's birthday

Daddy's birthday started early so that we could give him his birthday cake, which of course Al helped to bake, and also his surprise birthday presents. We had some rather smart t-shirts made for him with the photo of Daddy and Billy Bragg from last year's Wordfest and the caption "Daddy and Uncle Billy" ... a t-shirt each for Daddy, Al and Annie. Sadly Mummy didn't get one so won't be able to match the rest of her family. Check out the mad morning hair - Al's Cambridge professor look!

Getting used to baby Annie

Al is spending lots of time getting used to his baby sister at the moment. He is very enthusiastic about her and alternates between diving on her to cuddle her, and slapping her across the head in his excitement. Initially it was cute to take them both shopping in a double Tesco trolley but that's just not safe now! Here's our lad cuddling Annie proudly, and then a pic of him sharing his beloved books with her. She doesn't look too keen so far but we're hoping she will share his love of books before too long ...

Keeping things normal

In the midst of the thunderbolt arrival of our new baby we're trying to keep things as normal as possible for Al. Here he is with his lovely childminder, Sarah, and his two old pals who also go to Sarah - Joanna and Katie. Sarah transports the children either by triple buggy or with 3 sets of reins like a little set of huskies. Cute huh?

Al finally gets to meet Annie!

Al finally got to meet his new little sister today and was delighted to be able to point out where her knees, nose, eyes and ears were! Mummy and Daddy are hoping that he is always as pleased to see her.

Al's little sister Annie has arrived!

On Wednesday 23rd January 2008 Al's little sister Annie arrived at 5-45 a.m. (weighing a healthy 7 lb 9 oz.) after giving mummy and daddy a bit of a scare! Here are some pictures of her from the day that she was born. Al is really looking forward to meeting her!

Christmas 2007

We had a busy Christmas, with Nanny, Gran, Grandma and Grandad all coming to stay for about a week. However we were a bit rubbish at getting photos this time! Al really enjoyed having lots of time to bond with his grandparents ... here's a pic of him with his Nanny - he spent a lot of time on the sofa with her going through his entire library!

Daddy cooked a lovely big Christmas lunch ... which culminated in a very boozy Christmas pud. Al had a blob of pud and LOVED it. He did sleep very well afterwards! Here he is with Grandma licking his plate and spoon clean.

One highlight of Christmas was that Daddy got to spend lots of time with Al too. It was a season of vocab explosion with our lad learning lots of new words, including HoHo (Father Christmas), No (Either no or Snowman depending on context!) and Reeeee (Christmas tree). On top of that he started putting 2 words together, like "more bubbles" in the bath, and one phrase he learned from Grandad - "Shut door"!

Back to normal life ...

... with a big change. Al has a new childminder, Sarah, who is really lovely and very brave. Not only does she have Al but also his mates Joanna, Matthew and Katie (only 3 out of the 4 at once though!). They go out and about in a triple buggy looking very cute, or with one in a buggy and Al and Joanna on reins! We'll try and get a photo soon.

Then last week was Katie's dedication and lunch. We don't have a nice photo of Katie and Al together yet (best not to include the one of K crying because Al has nicked the balloon she wanted) but in the meantime here's a rare photo of Mummy and Al. Mummy is wishing she'd brushed her hair before the photo but Al has no such concerns for how he looks! The lunch was very nice but it looks like Al's favourite bit was the chocolates the waitress brought with the coffees at the end.

Summer holidays

We spent 3 weeks on the move - first to Brussels where Al got to meet Alexandre, born 2 weeks before he was. Laurence and Marc, his mum and dad, got married 2 weeks before us as well. However they were adamant they're not expecting their 2nd child 2 weeks before ours is due! The 2 boys had a ball together.

We popped up north to see Grandma and Grandad after Grandma's hip op then had a week in Wales with a visit to Nanny in Bristol on the way there and back. Here's Al with Nanny.

In Wales we visited some lovely beaches including places Mummy went to as a kid over 30 years ago. Al really loved the sea and showed no fear even when he went face first into the water. Here's a photo of him with Becky who played with him lots (sorry Becky - didn't get your face in!) and one with Daddy.

Also in Wales he made his stage debut with Daddy when the kids from the creche of the Lifelink conference got up to sing Heads and Shoulders, Knees and Toes to everyone.

Summer in the village

Between my mum and Mandy (who has sadly just given up childminding) we were given lots of toys for the garden which are providing entertainment for Al and his mates, as well as chance to learn about sharing and dealing with conflict!

This photo of Al and Katie with the red car came seconds before a fight broke out because they both wanted to be in the car at the same time. And no, they couldn't possibly go one in the red car and one in the pink car! K's mum solved the problem by squeezing them both into the driving seat but sadly I didn't get a photo.

In this photo of Al (victorious cos everyone else has gone home and he's uncontested in the red car?) you can see our vast crop from our apple tree in the background.

Who says I look like my Daddy?

Or as Kate put it - he looks like his Daddy but he talks like his Mummy!

Day trip to Mole Hall

We went to see the animals and play in the sand with Harry and Johnny and their mummy. Due to the fact that each time we've been to the seaside either Al has been asleep or the tide has been in, he has never before actually walked on sand. So his chance came on our day trip today when he and Johnny had a merry time feeling the sand beneath their feet.

Al's 2nd folk festival

We had a great time at the festival and managed to stay for most of the 4 days. Al got to sample some of the most important festival experiences, such as having a boogie, tasting Mummy and Daddy's favourite festival food (curried goat) and sheltering from the sun (in England in the summer?).

O and you can't see it very clearly on here but we did treat Al to a "Cool as Folk" t-shirt which he wore with pride!

Ooo nearly forgot to mention that Al really took off walking properly at the festival, much to Daddy's delight!

Mummy's Birthday

We celebrated Mummy's birthday a bit late, and thanks to the wonderful British summer weather we couldn't go for the picnic we'd intended, but we did get a very childfriendly evening (early evening!) out at Bella Italia.
Here's a rare family photo of the 3 (so far!) P's.