Happy 2nd birthday!!

Dear Little Miss,

Well, I can't believe that you are 2 today! Where has that time gone??
It still doesn't seem 5 minutes ago that you were a teeny tiny baby and now you are a proper mini girl, no more 'baby' left in you - so grown up!
Here are some of my favourite piccies of you this year:

All the way back in January - big girl walking!

I know there are soo many, but I just found so many that I really liked!
They start all the way back in January, where you are showing off your walking skills and then helping me to make your birthday 'thank you' cards!
Playing in the garden with Little Man pushing you in the car, followed by some very cute smiley piccies! Next up is more fun in the garden, and a special piccie with Auntie Charlotte, on one of her Tuesday visits. Funny faces at breakfast follows - you had me laughing soo hard when you did that! Next up is on the swing at the family day out in Dinton Pastures, sitting in the washing basket with Little Man and watching telly - as you do, then a brilliant piccie of you wearing your hat that shrunk - very Michael Jackson! Some family piccies next, I loved the one of us all in my bed, very nice way to wake up :-) Next we have cool shades, on the mobile and more cool shades! Finally exploring with homemade coconut playdoh, then the day you took all the drawers out of the tidy and got in yourself - my friend Ruth called it a 'child tidy' which did make me giggle! Last of all is you all grown up on the morning of your second birthday, very proud of your new scooter!

You have just changed soo soo much over the last year! You and Little Man seem to be consuming some kind of magical growth potion, as you've both shot up in the last few weeks!
You try really hard with your words now and babble away, which is just so cute! You are at the 'look at this mumma' stage, pointing out everything that you see, even though most of the time, I have no idea what you are saying ;-) You have the normal; yeh and nah, dadda, ada (Little Man), nanneee, ganeee, and FINALLY we have mumma and even mummeee! You don't know how long I have been waiting to not be called dadda! It now seems to be your favourite word as you say it over, and over, and over again! Add a whine and you'll be in training for grumpy teenager ;-) Also popular are; teddy, car, dog, there, here, and share - you want everyone to share with you, mostly food!! But the cutest at the moment is hot-hot, as you've learnt not to touch things that are hot :-)

Your favourite toys at the moment are all your cuddly teddies, that you have decided need to be wearing nappies! You love Happy Land and got 2 new sets to add to your fairy collection, also having tea parties with me and the singing teapots - great fun! You also love zooming cars around the house chasing Little Man. Singing is another favourite thing, with 'twinkle twinkle',  'wind the bobbin up', 'the hokey kokey', 'head shoulders knees and toes', the most popular.

At the moment, your week pans out as follows; Monday at Zoe's, Tuesday we go to Little Quavers music group and then you spend the rest of the day with daddy, Wednesday we are going to start going to ABC toddler group at St Mary's church, Thursday is with Zoe and then daddy again and then we have a rest day at home or with daddy depending on the week. You spend every other weekend at daddy's. When you're with me, we go often to church on Sundays. We are now looking at starting you in a nursery placement, and hopefully in September you might get a place at Pied Piper, where Little Man went.

I'm just so proud of how you have grown into such a lovely little miss! Your thirst for exploring and learning are just brilliant! Looking forward to what this year has for you!

Love you loads now and always!
Mummy xxxx

Painting project - complete!

FINALLY! Little Miss has finally got her own bedroom!
Over half term, mum and I spent a few exhausting days (and nights) clearing, cleaning and decorating her little bedroom. I actually really enjoyed the process and have decided that painting is quite relaxing! I was on 'brush' duties - corners, edges and other bits and mum was on the roller. Unfortunately, we didn't realise how uneven the walls were, so I have to keep going round and touching up the gaps, but it looked soooo much better when we finally finished :-)

Here are a few piccies to show the progress:

BEFORE:

As you can see, it was quite a dump!
We the cleared and cleaned and got ready to paint.

All ready to paint!

We had a few mishaps! Mum managed to knock off her tray of white paint (that we used as first 2 coats) Luckily we had some old sheets down on the carpet! Unluckily, I managed to tread in the paint, resulting in lovely white feet, heehee!

I love the colour we picked out! It is just so fresh and girlie! It really helped to brighten up what was quite a dark room (it used to belong to my older brother, before he moved into his own place) 

It was a bit of a rush to get the furniture back in before Little Miss and Little Man got back from their dads, so I didn't quite finish on my own. Little man helped to place all of the finishing touches, and his dad helped me move the cot and hang a large picture on the wall. 

Very pleased with the end results:

AFTER: 

Both Little Man and Little Miss seemed to love the end results too!
Now, Little Man is working towards getting his own bedroom decorated, as I think he's a little jealous, bless him! He has to earn stars for being good at bedtime - something that can be very hit and miss! So far, he has earned a star for every night since he's been home, so it seems to be working as a great incentive for good behaviour ;-)
He has decided that he wants to have a rainbow, with sun, moon, stars, rain clouds, and probably a load more things that I can't remember! I have decided to enlist the help of one or a few of my arty friends to paint a mural on the largest wall in his room, as I don't think my skills would stretch that far, heehee!
Little Miss has been brilliant sleeping in her new bedroom, so YAY for that!
Oooh, that's also another 'Day Zero Project' completed, so double YAY! :-D

Another day zero project completed

Yesterday, I decided that we were going to do our 'Tie a message to a balloon and let it go' challenge, though it didn't go quite as planned ;-)
To start with, I forgot that it could jut be a note, so we did wishes instead! Plus, my mum had the genius idea of putting out wishes inside the balloons, so then they stay waterproof, so we did that too!

 Little Man and I had to chose a wish for Little Miss. He had some great suggestions like 'have a strawberry' but I think the final, 'have a finished bedroom' was a winner in the end - no hidden agenda of course ;-)

Here we all are, ready with Auntie Charlotte, to release our wishes

 Then, to our dismay, they all dropped like they were full of lead! I don't think it was windy enough, so I was going to save them for a windier day. However, Little Man thought as one of them popped, he would help ensure that the rest of them popped too! I found all our folded up wishes and took them inside for another day. Then I had a weird conversation with my mum who said that some big company had been intending to release loads of balloons in celebration of some achievement / anniversary and had put it off after an environment group emailed them explaining the damage it would cause to birds and wildlife! I had never even considered the impact of burst balloons ending up in water ways or worse being eaten by an animal or bird that then choked on it! So I had another think! I decided that a good alternative would be to burn them! That way, minimum damage to environment - as the fire would be teeny!
Well, half a box of matches later, I finally managed to light our 4 wishes! Then we watched them float away in the smoke, hoping that one day they might come true :-)

Little Miss; 1 year (and 1 month) on!

Dear Little Miss,
Well, I can't believe a whole year (and a month - bad, unorganised me!) has gone past!
It doesn't seem like 5 minutes ago that you were first opening your eyes and now look how you've grown!

These are just a few of my favourite piccies of you!








You already surprise me on how much you can do now!
You started to try and walk at around 9 months and did a kind of 'army crawl' using just your arms for getting around on the floor. 'Real' crawling happened after your first birthday - and boy are you speedy now!
You now use the furniture to hold onto when you walk, but it won't be long before you're venturing to hands-free!
You have always loved rocking. Your favourite songs (and actions) are still 'Row, row, row your boat' and 'See-Saw'.  You love riding on your rocking ladybird, with me singing a silly song 'rocking baby' (to the tune of 'Rocking robin') which makes you smile!
Everything gets chewed at the moment, as your molars are starting to come through - poor you!
You are also a little Pickle-bum, as any tiny little speck you find on the floor goes straight in your mouth! You're like a little human-hoover! No matter how often we hoover, you always manage to find something!
You love your food and have been doing really well on your 'grown up' solid food. You are very good and only drink water and milk!
You are a total water baby and adore splashing in the bath. We've taken you swimming a few times, but it's something that I will try to do more often, I promise!
You love cuddles and kisses, but hate having your nappy changed - 30 minutes is the longest I've battled with you so far!
You like trying to join in games with Aiden - especially cars. You also enjoy playing with the toys that make noises - rattles shakers etc. There's one that's like a helter-skelter with balls that roll round and down.
You have started to say a few little words, but mostly still babble!
Aiden is 'Ada'
Grannie is 'Aga'
I'm sometimes 'Umma' but your favourite word is 'hiya' with your cute little waves!
I can't wait to see how you grow and develop over the next year!
Love you always
xxxxx