Snap: Girl's Night In

Daddy got to go to the cinema with his friends to watch innocent aliens getting slaughtered. Tara and mummy get the better side of the deal: girly bath, juice instead of water and pizza for dinner (every piece of pineapple for Tara, just so we're clear) and permission to go to sleep in mum's bed. A proper treat... Although i'm not too sure about the two pieces of pizza walking about the table hand in hand conversing about trips to parks in london while leaving a tomatoey trails everywhere... Should we get Papi to clean up after us as a special part of his night-out deal? ;)

Courgie Boy

We have been into the garden again to harvest some of our crop, and we're so impressed with monster courgette number two that this time we both pose with it, and Tara has a nibble of its skin. Not only has this impressive fruit matched and exceeded courgette number one's measurements, but it has actually caught up with our own fast growing baby boy: 1285 grams. A perfect match with the statistical average that the midwife proclaims every time I see her.




So we pose. "Cheese!" Talking about weight gain and cheese, I've now put on some 11kg (by week 30), which is all I ever put on during the whole of the last pregnancy. It's a bit frustrating. Eating nothing but courgette for the next 2 months seems a feasible option, but luckily Tara dislikes the stuff, so she will do as my excuse.
Courgie boy, of course, is much loved by Tara. He gets a kiss and a cuddle in the morning and she is very careful with her big mummy "because you have our baby in your tummy." Like son, like mother... I'm feeling a bit like a massive courgette myself. Someone tell me - how do I train my big considerate girl to put my socks on me in the morning? And is this anything to do with Tara saying: "I don't like your attitude. I don't like your courgette"?

PS: Enough about courgettes. The third weighed 1900g and I've still not worked out what else to do with it. We'll go with The Smaller The Better for the rest of the season. And for baby's birth.

(24.08.)

Snap: Friday

This is one of the reasons I love Fridays. Tasty dinner, and all I have to do for it is precisely NOTHING HA HA HA!

Birthday Girl

Birthday blog! A month late... (Brandy, your turn now!)

A week of celebrations, and not a day less, for this loveliest of little girls. Not to mention weeks of build up and happy-birthday-singing. Happy birthday to Tara. Happy birthday to Mummy. Happy birthday to Daddy. Happy birthday to Dolly. Happy birthday to crocodowel. Happy birthday to... you name it, Tara sings it.
So here goes. A birthday week in many pictures and few words.

26.7. Sunday. Family celebrations have been brought forward so we can party properly for a whole day, without any distraction, or any parent shooting off to work. (Good plan, will repeat.)

Cake? Who cares! Let me relight the candles and blow them out again (45 times, and again and some more during the week that follows).

Into the living room for all those lovely presents! Tara goes straight for the biggest (wrapped) one. It's not even from mum & dad ;-)

All unwrapped and rather happy.


Rounding off the day with an ice cream by the beach (sheltered from the wind round arandom corner and never mind the rubbish bag that also sought shelter before us).

27.7. Monday. Birthday! But all parents shoot off to work, and Tara is at nursery. She's allowed to bring prepacked cakes (home-made is forbidden) and lolli pops, and her friends sing for her.

Tuesday through to Saturday. Baby birthday muffins are demanded and eaten on the way home from nursery every day. Much singing. Much talk about the "Dora Explorer and Bob the Builder" cake that she pines for (WHY??!). Looming on the horizon: "My party at Play Bay, and all my friends will come!" Mummy packs party bags for 16 children, just to be on the safe side, and bakes cake, resolving tobe the perfect host and talk to every parent present (i.e. up to 20 mostly near-strangers and some strangers) in only two hours, while buying everyone tea/coffee/latte and being a reassuring presence to Tara at all times simultaneously. Heroic endeavour.

Let's not forget the time and effort Papi put into assembling the much loved small-girl trampoline!

2.8. Party day! Tara takes her dollies, greatly looking forward to it all, but is somewhat overwhelmed by the amount of presents, people and noise. She barely plays with anybody other than mum and dad, gets to see her cake fora whjole 30 seconds before it is carried off to be cut up (though some girls try very hard to be her best friend for the day, while others are even shyer) and only relaxes properly for the last half hour. And yet she remembers what a great party she has had, that everybody came, that she had exactly the cake she had wished for, and that she loved it all. Memory, ey?

All dressed up in her princess dress, and Baby Isabelle and Baby Sofia have come to party too.

Snack time with lots of friends (must remember to ask friend-on-left's mum for permission to blog daughter's picture...)

Flying high with daddy (same as above... nursery would be very cross if we just blogged other people's faces!)

It's eventually over. We tried for a trip to the beach with best friend Carter and his lot but the beach was infested with hover flies and ladybirds, and Tara was hysterical within ten minutes, and had to be carried off home. Nevertheless, she declared in the car "I did have a lovely time with Carter on the beach!"
At home, the parents crash first while Tara arranges and rearranges her multitude of birthday cards with great focus for at least an hour. My mother told me that she used to say the birthdays were worse than actually giving birth. I can see where she's coming from.


And finally, Tara is out as well. As are the babies. They all had a very long day too.


The next day Tara sings one last happy birthday song. "Happy birthday to... NOBODY." It's a bit of a relief really.

PS.: I have come to the conclusion that a two-friend-party at home would have been more age appropriate... but at least I've talked to 20 parents and have reaped one counter-invite straight on the day. Another party coming up - this time we're guests and don't do a thing!)

Snap: Monster Courgette

Goodness me! The fifth zucchini I'm harvesting from the garden is an 800gram whopper, and officially...uh now i need to work out where in this pregnancy I actually am to compare average baby weight with garden fruit... only 400grams lighter than baby! Bummer - I was going to eat that thing for dinner tonight but despaired a bit of my (considerable!) abilities to eat quite that much after I had picked it. It should have stayed on another week or so, to see if it would have caught up with baby. Tara needs the weight lifting exercise more than I need the extra veg!

PS.: Starting week 30 in a few days and as of Saturday in love with this expensive pushchair.

Look Who's on the Sofa Now

Yep, that's right. The pregnant lady. After the dishes and everything else (including half a banana loaf cake). Now playing: Coldplay, Viva la Vida. What a treat!

I Want my Dinner!

Little voice from my left: "I AM SO HUNGRY! I know! I will look at a book while I wait for my dinner!"

Then, quiet.

Next, humming and improvised singing: "I'm looking at my li-be-ra-ry book! And when I'm done, you can have it... Mummy, I'm SO HUNGRY and I WANT MY DINNER!"

Well, it's ready now. Dinner time!

*** 20 minutes later ***

"Tara, pleeeease let me take another picture of you ok? You can say 'cheese' to me because you helped me so beautifully putting the cheese on our dinner, ok? Pleeeease?" So it's ok (after a bit of negociating and persuading and the promise that I won't take a single picture tomorrow).

"CHEESE!"