Frazzled Working Mum

Back to School

2011-02-02T14:38:00.001+11:00

After the long summer holidays, the girls are back to school and we are all adjusting to our new routine. Lauren started kindergarten yesterday with her new class and new teacher, Mr Agnew. Many of her old friends from Prep started Kindergarten at different schools or in different classes, so she was disappointed not to see them after the long holiday. Jocelyn restarted pre-prep but also with mainly new children; I think she missed her sister, who was no longer in Prep.

Both girls were a bit nervous at first, surrounded by the unfamiliar. However, by the afternoon they seemed to have settled in as reports at coming home time were good. This was a real relief for us as parents – we’re aware of the number of changes that they’ve faced over the last 18 months or so and that as a family we could all do with a bit of stability now.

To give them some stability, we are going to have just one nanny who is going to stay with us for the foreseeable future. The girls get on really well with her; we have been very lucky. Our previous nannies, who could only do part time or casual work for us this year, will still see them on the occasional weekend.

I’m going to invite some of Lauren’s little friends that she misses around for some play dates, to ease her into the transition better. Jocey will be pleased to see them too – she loved playing with “the big girls”!

At least there will be no more house moves for some time.

Zoom Zoom Zoom!

2010-08-20T12:12:00.001+10:00

Last weekend, Lauren had her first ever proper birthday party at Zoom. I think it was a huge success because she had an amazing time and loved it! I was a little afraid at first that she might be shy seeing her friends out of context but she took it all in her stride and had lots of fun running, bouncing and zooming around the climbing frames with all her classmates.

We also had lots of opportunity to get to know the other parents a bit better – almost impossible when you are a working mum, especially as I rarely do drop off now. Besides, everyone is always in a rush to get to work, so it’s often impossible to have a chat.

I think a lot of the parents hadn’t realised that we’d just moved from the UK. However, we are fast making friends!

On the day, the children arrived, gave their presents to Lauren and promptly disappeared into the vast network of climbing frames. We had to round them up again after half an hour to feed them lunch and cake – an interesting experience! In this photo, you can see Lauren sitting in the birthday girl seat surrounded by her friends.

Here is the birthday girl with two of her friends, Sarah and Emma. Jocey is in the background playing with her balloon!

More of Lauren’s friends waiting impatiently for the cake to arrive…

Birthday girl and Mummy cutting the cake after the candles were blown out. She wasn’t keen to do it herself – I don’t think she wanted to cut into it and spoil it!

She clearly had a great time at the party and I think all her little friends did too. We did do a bit of running around but at the end of it I felt we had been good hosts. The next morning, Lauren had a marathon present opening session. She was really excited and loved seeing what her friends had chosen for her.

Afterwards, Lauren and Jocey spent all afternoon playing with the various toys and gifts – we have more than enough to keep the children entertained for a long time to come! I was really touched by the thoughtfulness of her little friends as many wrote out the birthday cards themselves and drew little pictures for Lauren inside the cards (and the inspired gift choices by their mummies – it gave me more ideas for the next party Lauren has to go to!).

Lauren spent the latter part of the afternoon and the early evening writing out thank you cards for all her friends. It was a huge task (20 cards) but we did it together (I wrote out the actual thank you part for her) and I explained how important it was because of all the care and thoughtfulness shown to her by her friends in giving her presents on her birthday. Unfortunately, as Lauren has a short attention span, it took us a while to complete the task but by the evening it was all done and I was proud of her for doing it.

A successful end to a great 5th birthday!

Cake Marathon

2010-08-13T22:33:00.001+10:00

Tomorrow, we are having Lauren’s first big birthday party. She’s going to be 5 and has invited all her friends from her class in prep; we are taking 26 children to the local indoor soft play centre called Zoom. Being a winter birthday and not being sure how the weather would be, I didn’t take any chances. Perhaps if we are in a bigger house next year, we’ll consider something outdoors.

Lauren’s never had a party like this before; this was partly our reluctance to host one for toddlers in a small house with almost no garden and partly because Lauren never asked for one before now. Lauren has always been a shy child and didn’t really enjoy parties when she was younger. She ended up clinging to me and not playing with any of the other children at most of the parties we ever went to – if not for all of it then at least for the first 30 minutes.

Since coming to Australia, she has really gained in confidence and is so much more at ease with herself. I remember taking the girls to the park in the first week we were here – I noticed that the girls were too shy to approach the other children to play with them. I was really sad to see it. However, within a short time of starting school and nursery here, they were different children. I think it’s partly to do with the relaxed and friendly way of life here – their school friends were quick to befriend them and make them feel welcome, and the fact that they are happy and settled, and thus more confident.

So she asked me for a birthday party, and I agreed that she could have one.

When I went to organise her cake, I had initially planned to order one through the local cake shop Delany’s; I’d been told that it was very good. When I walked in and saw their sample book, I had to agree – each cake is unique and designed to the customer’s specifications. I could see the staff constructing and decorating the cakes by hand behind the counter. The cakes were really amazing!

However, I felt I couldn’t justify the cost at the moment as we are saving hard for a house purchase, and the cakes start at about $70 AUD, getting progressively more expensive as the cake becomes more decorated and complex. Maybe one for a special birthday, like an 18th or a 40th!

I was left with no other option but to make my own. Sadly, I am not artistic – I have an eye for colour and design but I cannot draw or paint to save myself. This did not put me off (well, perhaps a little!) and armed with my trusted Jane Asher book, I set about making Lauren a cake she could be proud of. My previous attempts had all been rather more humble. This was Lauren’s first ever birthday cake.

Although I can make a tasty cake, I find the decorating part really difficult – when my brother Jason and my sister-in-law Charlotte asked me to make their wedding cake, I stipulated that I was happy to bake them but someone else had to decorate it.

Lauren loves fairies and princesses – one of her favourite cartoons is “Ben and Holly’s Little Kingdom”, from the same company responsible for Peppa Pig. Just like the Peppa Pig cartoons, there is a lot of great humour aimed at adults as well as children. I love Ben and Holly too!

So it was from Ben and Holly that I took my inspiration for the cake. I was going to attempt the Fairy Forest Cake.

Following Jane’s instructions, I baked a large 10 inch chocolate sponge to form the base of the cake. I always tweak the recipe to lessen the amount of sugar and also added a dollop of crème fraiche to keep the cake moist. Having gone to a few birthday parties, the cakes and the icing tend to be overly sweet, which I really dislike. Here was the end result. You can see all the icing that I’d made up ready to go in the background.

First, the butter icing went onto the top and sides. I then had to roughen the surface on the top to make it look like grass. So here is the cake with the “grass” on.

As well as the cake, I’d made some butter cookies the day before in the shape of trees, plants, flowers and butterflies. I had to raid the girls’ Play-Doh set to get the cutters – their play cutters were all in the correct shapes for the cake (my cooking ones were sadly much more boring). Naturally, I washed the cutters before using them on the cookie dough!

A few hours later, I’d decorated the cookies with the brightly coloured Royal Icing – painstakingly applied with a small paintbrush for better control and some texture – and applied the necessary sparkly cachous (the metallic edible beads). Here is the finished cake in all its glory, complete with 2 fairy princesses and a little fairy with her fairy cat.

I wish you could have seen Lauren’s face when she came home from the park to find her cake – she was in awe and loved it! I have put the cake at the back of the kitchen worktop to protect it from prying fingers.

The trip to Zoom in the car will be interesting tomorrow – I have no cake box! Thank goodness it is only a 5 minute drive away…

Wollongong, Sound of the Sea

2010-08-12T18:56:00.001+10:00

We call this city home now and have done for almost exactly 5 months. We love it here and in many ways it found us as much as we discovered it. When we first talked about coming back to Australia, we had no idea we’d be coming here. We’d never travelled to the Illawarra back in 2002, and had never heard of the place until my agent first mentioned that there was a job going there that I ought to consider.

This is an aerial view of the city; what a beautiful place! We live right on the harbour at the moment. The name Wollongong is unusual – one theory is that it comes from an Aboriginal word meaning “sound of the sea”.

When we initially arrived we were living in temporary accommodation by North Beach. Of course one of our first jobs on arrival was to explore the beach!

Here are the girls playing down at the beach shortly after we’d arrived. This was the day after they said that they didn’t want to go back to London – and who can blame them?

Despite us arriving in early autumn, the girls spent most of their days out and about, playing at the park and enjoying the weather.

It wasn’t long before we found ourselves a more permanent base to call home; a gorgeous flat by the harbour.

We love living here. The beach is just across the road and there is also a children’s playground there, which the children love.

We had about two weeks in the flat without furniture before our belongings were released by Customs in Sydney. It was quite a shock to see all our stuff after almost a year of living out of boxes!

It took about two weeks to unpack properly, but when all was finished, it was a really good feeling to be finally “home”. The girls were also thrilled to have all their toys and books back.

We didn’t bring their beds from the UK because they were toddler beds and not true singles (and because one got broken in Richmond!) but we bought them a “princess bunk bed” to compensate for this.

Initially, they both loved their bunk beds but more recently, Jocey has been going through a phase of refusing to sleep in her own bed (and wanting to come into our bedroom instead). I wonder if this is partly to do with the fact that she can’t see Lauren in the night – in their old bedroom, there was enough room for the beds to go side by side but there wasn’t enough room for this in our present flat.

Even I got some new toys – a shiny new fridge, a big new washing machine and new tumble drier. I love the big capacities of my new washer and drier. Seems daft that you can get excited by this – but when it makes your life easier, it makes you happier!

The weeks flew by but we did manage to see Aunt Candice and Uncle Kenneth on their return from an extended holiday in Hong Kong. They decided to see us in Wollongong and came to visit us one Saturday in June.

I cooked a big seafood lunch and we even had some barbequed satays – our first BBQ in Australia! I think we were all really full afterwards; a walked by the beach certainly helped our digestion. We all had a great time and it was lovely to see them.

Over the last two months, we have been very busy – Jase started work with a subsidiary company of one of the big banks in Sydney and commutes up every day. Now that he’s got used to the rhythm of that commute by train, he tells me that it’s actually not that bad. It means an early start and a late finish, but he gets time to sit down on the train and enjoy his new iPad.

Of course, it was also a welcome relief to see him working in a role suited to his level of experience and finally get paid properly for the first time (surprisingly, he got a big pay rise compared to the UK).

Plus, I am pretty sure that this view compensates for the commute – this is the view from his desk!

Back in Wollongong, we’ve had a number of fun outings, including a trip to Symbio Zoo back in April. The girls loved seeing all the animals; here they are patting the miniature horses.

They especially loved seeing the koalas and kangaroos up close. It was really nicely set up and ideal for families with young children. We all had a great time!

More recently, we also went to the circus – a first for everyone except me. It was really good fun (except the opening act with the lions was slightly terrifying when it became obvious that the lions weren’t in the mood to “play” and the handler looked like he might get eaten any moment!) and the girls got to ride on ponies at the interval – which they loved.

The girls have also had fun going to the theatre for the first time. I was initially expecting problems because we had heard from her teachers that Lauren had not enjoyed a show at the Sydney Tower when she and her class had gone on a day trip to Sydney. She cried and had to be taken out because she was scared. It was a shame because I think otherwise she had really enjoyed going to see the Opera House and the Tower, as part of their term learning about buildings and architecture.

So I promised the girls that they could each bring a favourite soft toy to the theatre. I really wanted to take them because I thought it was time they experienced the theatre and the children’s musical that was in town sounded a lot of fun.

To my surprise and relief, they loved it. Despite being apprehensive when the lights initially went down, as soon as the actors came on stage and the singing started, they were mesmerised. Afterwards, they both asked if they could go to the theatre again.
Here they are after “Wombat Stew” last month.

To round off a great day, we went down to the beach for ice cream, and to enjoy the winter sun.

Two weeks ago, we went back to the theatre (after it went down so well with them the first time) to see Dora the Explorer, the musical. They both still enjoy Dora, and this was based on the story of the City of the Lost Toys.

They were impatient waiting for the musical to start. When Boots and Dora finally came onto the stage, their faces lit up with excitement! They had a wonderful time.

The thing I like about the theatre in Wollongong (the Illawarra Performing Arts Centre or IPAC) is that it is a really intimate venue, so great for taking the children. At Dora, we were sat in the second last row, but still had a good view of the stage and weren’t too far away.

I think we will definitely be going back in the future. Hooray for our new lives in the ‘Gong!

Winters

2010-08-12T15:04:00.000+10:00

When we left the UK, it was winter. Travelling to the Southern Hemisphere, we found ourselves facing another winter. It’s been a strange year.

It’s almost exactly five months since we came to Australia. I can’t believe how quickly that time has flown, nor how quickly we’ve settled into life here. Although we’ve had to adapt to new things, mostly things have felt oddly right somehow.

It’s almost Lauren’s fifth birthday – and her very first winter birthday. I’m baking a chocolate birthday cake for her – she’s invited 25 of her school friends to a party this weekend, so I’ll be busy getting everything ready for that later.

Back in our last UK winter, we celebrated another birthday - Granddad’s 70th birthday with him in York. This is Granddad opening his birthday cards and presents in the morning (girls helping of course).

Here is one in the evening with the steak and kidney pudding that I cooked specially for the birthday dinner.

Despite our facing our second winter, I only have to look at these photos to realise that Australian winters are a lot kinder than British ones. This particular day in Edinburgh, we took the girls down to the playground at the Dell, near my parents’ house. It was bitterly cold and there was snow on the ground.

The girls were wrapped up in about 4 layers. I was reminded how much colder Edinburgh gets compared to London!

Although we were sorry to leave family and friends behind in the UK, we set off from Edinburgh to Hong Kong with a fair amount of excitement. After all, it was the start of our new life in Australia.

More family celebrations followed on our arrival to Hong Kong. We were treated to an amazing banquet on the second night with my Grandparents, Aunts and Uncles. We went to Grandfather’s favourite restaurant in Mong Kok. Here we are with the whole family!

During our time in Hong Kong, there was time for a visit to Kowloon Park, which was my favourite park as a little girl. Here the girls at looking at the goldfish in the big central pond.

We were treated to a visit to Happy Valley, home of Hong Kong horse racing; we had a really fun evening in one of the executive boxes enjoying the buffet dinner and the races, courtesy of Aunt Kitty. I won an unbelievable $580 HKD (amateur’s luck, I think) – I think everyone else made a loss that night!

And of course, no visit to Hong Kong would be complete without a trip to Disneyland Hong Kong. The girls had been looking forward to this for months.

Last time we went, Lauren had been pretty much scared of everything. This time, I just about managed to persuade her to go on some of the rides, but she wasn’t impressed! Jocey, on the other hand, loved all the rides and was desperate to go on more.

The standout moment of the holiday was definitely our encounter with the “Princess Mice”. The girls met the mice from Cinderella and absolutely adored them. There were lots of hugs, kisses and giggles and they almost refused to leave! Here we are with the Princess Mice.

We also had the opportunity to watch the parade (which they loved – they watch the video footage Jase took at the time over and over again), meet Mickey, Minnie, Goofy and Pooh bear. I think Minnie was their next favourite, followed by Pooh, who was apparently very soft!

Soon, even this time came to an end and we found ourselves at our last family meal in Hong Kong. Even though my family were sad to see us leave, they gave us a great send off and soon we were on the plane to Australia.

Our new lives were about to start.

Our last winter in the UK

2010-05-29T20:06:00.000+10:00

When I wrote the post about the Tooth Fairies, we were just heading into our last winter in the UK. What a winter it turned out to be – bitterly cold with more persistent snow on the ground than I could remember for decades.

We were all trapped indoors for long periods of time. Jocey decided that our flat needed some redecoration; I found this on our tumble drier one evening!

I think they knew something was happening, or perhaps they sensed the enormous stress Jase and I were going through in order to pull off the move to Australia. They were often unsettled at night and sometimes demanded to sleep in our bed. The lack of sleep for us made things pretty tough, and poor Jase developed high blood pressure as a result.

It started to snow on December 16th. No-one was that excited at first because it didn’t look too impressive to start with. Little did we realise what was to come!

It just didn’t stop. And when it melted, fresh snow fell and we went back to square one. We had a white Christmas for the first time in years, and it was bitterly cold, regularly falling to several degrees below zero during the day and at night. However, it always felt colder because of the constant northerly winds, making the wind chill factor really unpleasant.

Our paths, parks and gardens were turned into a winter wonderland. Wrapped up against the cold, we braved the conditions because the girls were going stir crazy in the house. The girls wouldn’t stay out longer than 15 minutes before asking to go indoors.

On top of this, when the snows came, we lost power in our flat for 5 days (fortunately not in a row). The cold took out some circuit in our local substation, depriving part of our block and several nearby buildings of electricity. The nights were especially hard; cooking by candle and torchlight on a (luckily) gas hob and snuggling under our duvets in the living room because it was so cold without heating and hot water. The ambient temperature was so low that our fridge and freezer stuff remained chilled despite the power being off – I guess this was something to be thankful for.

We did end up eating out and getting takeaways from our local Chinese Restaurant in Richmond quite a bit as a result – this was one positive thing to come out of the cold snap. Escaping to a brightly lit and warm restaurant was just so lovely; strange how a power cut makes you appreciate these things!

One weekend when the weather was a little bit warmer, we ventured out to the Science Museum and Natural History museums, aware that it might be our last opportunity for some time.

The girls loved looking around the exhibits and doing all the interactive things. Unfortunately, quite a large section suitable for the girls’ age group was closed for renovation. Despite this we had a really good time and enjoyed our lunch in the funky cafe, even if we couldn’t see the food properly due to the underlit tables!

At the end of the afternoon, we walked over to the Natural History Museum to see the dinosaurs. Lauren was particularly impressed with the T Rex (bizarrely – I thought she would be scared!) and came home with a cuddly version from the museum shop.

It was all too much for some others though…

During this time, every weekend we were trying to get ourselves ready for the big move in one way or another, whether this was to pack or to get rid of 8 years of accumulated junk. So when the day for the move finally came in mid February, we were ready for them and everything went smoothly.

In some ways, we were sad to say goodbye to the little flat in Richmond. Apart from the power cuts and the problems with the electricity points in the kitchen, we had a happy time there. When everything was packed in boxes on the final night, it was strange to see it so bare.

We were finally ready for a long string of goodbyes to our family and friends.

Leaving our old lives behind

2010-05-29T17:35:00.001+10:00

In late 2008 (yes, seems like an age ago now) Jase and I had a conversation about London. For a long time, we hadn’t been particularly happy with our lives there. We had moved to London after our year in Sydney because work had taken us there but neither of us were comfortable living in the big city.

I think, to be fair, that initially it was bearable because we were just the two of us. However, we were already beyond the age where going out all the time was attractive so I guess didn’t make the most of the potential nightlife in London. We occasionally went to the theatre, the opera and to restaurants, but because the cost of living was so high and travelling was such a pain, we didn’t do this on a regular basis.

After the children were born, we quickly realised how difficult life in London with young children was, especially where both parents have to work. I couldn’t afford to go part-time and we ended up putting both children into nursery. We both worked long hours and felt exhausted all the time. Not much of a life at all.

I think sometime in November 2008, we realised that enough was enough. We both agreed that London wasn’t for us and that we wanted out. Every day, we felt like the walking dead, trapped in a never ending exhausting routine which held no fun and was always fuelled by money worries. With a massive mortgage and crippling childcare fees, our money wasn’t going very far at all and we were still living like students. Our accountant worked out that after our food and bills were paid we were living on about £75 per month between the four of us!

Not very encouraging for me after working so hard through 6 years at university and a further 10 years in training posts and sitting exams to become a consultant in the NHS. The pay was surprisingly poor (and no hope of private practice – nor urge to do it in my field; that was never my wish). I guess I was naive to think that becoming a consultant would have changed that.

I think that it wasn’t just London (although that played a large part); we did talk about moving to other places in the UK. To be frank, neither of us could think of anywhere else where we wanted to go to live and where the quality of life would have significantly improved for all of us. Nowhere held the special place in our hearts that Australia did. Hard to explain that to those who have not lived there before, but we loved the country, the multiculturalism (especially as our girls were from two cultures and I wanted them to be comfortable with that), the laid back and friendly attitude to life and the potential for a much more outdoors life - all so appealing.

It wasn’t an easy decision; we talked at length about how we would tell our family and friends, how we would deal with the inevitable negative comments and people who wouldn’t support our move. The hardest thing was not being able to talk about it; I couldn’t even blog until it was common news to all, including at work. I think even then, our families felt uncomfortable talking about something that they weren’t looking forward to.

We had tried to emigrate before in 2006 but the time had not been right. When I enquired about jobs at that time, the opportunities did not present themselves and we encountered a number of dead ends. So we shelved the idea, but to be honest it never left our minds.

Two years later, the time was right and when I started to make tentative enquiries with an agency, I was surprised by how quickly they responded with potential jobs. In a matter of a couple of months, I had a job interview lined up in Wollongong, the third largest population centre after Sydney in New South Wales, located just 60km south of Sydney.

I managed to go for a day trip (yes, how mad!) from Hong Kong during our holiday there in Feb 2009. It was really stressful because at the time Jocey was unwell with a fever in Hong Kong and I was worried about her. I landed in Sydney in the early morning after a 9 hour flight, drove to Wollongong, had my interview, drove back to Sydney to have dinner with my aunt and uncle, then drove back to the airport to catch the evening plane back to Hong Kong. I landed in Hong Kong in the early morning absolutely exhausted, but with a job offer on the table.

It then took a further year to get all the paperwork for my visas and professional registration sorted out. At times, the process was difficult and frustrating. We had to sell our house and get rid of a lot of unnecessary possessions in preparation, and with each step it felt like we were cutting another cord tying us to our old lives in the UK. Cathartic in many ways.

Additionally, life at work had become unbearable during 2009 with the endless unreasonable demands from management, wrangling over hours and pay and a strong sense that I was no longer able to make a difference to people, coupled with lack of recognition where I felt I had made a difference. Faced with absolutely no job satisfaction, I became very low and disillusioned, making it easier to walk away from the job and a workplace that I had initially loved.

When we stepped out of the plane and onto Australian soil back in March of this year, I firmly closed the book on that chapter of our lives. It was as if a massive weight had been lifted off our shoulders and we were free at last to live again.

Pause for breath

2010-05-29T16:25:00.001+10:00

I cannot believe it.

I am actually having a slow weekend.

I can’t actually remember the last time I had one of these rare beasts. My recent life seems to have been taken over with either childcare commitments or packing / unpacking boxes. We have lived in a state of impermanence for some time.

We’ve had a week of really changeable weather, with a major storm on Wednesday which threatened one of the local suburbs with flooding. I was taking part in a disaster exercise at work, only to be notified at the end of it that we might have to do it all for real.

Fortunately, the storm passed and no-one came to any harm; however, more wild weather has been forecast for this weekend, so we are staying put at home.

Lauren and I have been baking a cake this afternoon. It’s fast become my all time favourite recipe, the carrot cake one from the 1950’s Women’s Institute Cookbook that I found on holiday in Devon last year. She even helped me by licking out the bowl and doing the washing up (and not just by licking…).

The gorgeous smell of the cake has filled our apartment; I’ve just taken it out of the oven and will ice it with a cream cheese icing later. It only seems fair as we donated two such cakes to the TIGS Great Fete last weekend and we all missed out on actually eating some. I really hope whoever bought the cakes last weekend appreciated them!

So I guess that there’s no longer any excuse for not catching up on the last few months!

New Beginning

2010-03-12T00:55:00.002+11:00

I'm sitting in our hotel room in Hong Kong tonight on our last night before completing the final leg of our journey in emigrating to Australia. It has been quite a stressful process which has taken up about 15 months of our lives. However, we are hopeful that it will bring some really positive changes to our lives.

Once we find an internet connection in Australia, I am looking to resume the writing of this blog; so much has happened which has been important to document, even if it is difficult to put into words. However others have seen the events of the last year, it will be a record of our past for the family's future.

The meals have been eaten, the photos have been taken and almost all of our goodbyes have been said. Now it's about finding the time to write about the transition and looking forward to our new beginning in Australia.

The rush toward Christmas

2009-12-17T07:22:00.002+11:00

Last weekend we had the last of Lauren’s parties for this season. It’s been a busy time and she’s had a packed social calendar. Even Jocelyn, my two year old has been to some parties, so life has been non-stop.

My favourite has to be the one hosted by Lauren’s friend Oliver (who is Jocey’s best friend Georgia’s big brother) where the girls went together in almost matching fairy outfits. It was (of course) a Pirate and Fairy Party.

Now naturally, any self-respecting fairy would have a wand as well.

Jocey was really annoyed when she found out that her wand didn’t actually work. She was muttering “Acradabra” to herself and using the wand to hit things, like the furniture and her sister. Probably trying to see if she could changes us into frogs, bless her.

I think Lauren was really pleased that Jocey was invited and was coming with her. As I’ve said in previous posts, Lauren is really shy so I think she was looking forward to having Jocey along for company.

Like any good mum anticipating major sweetie consumption, I made the girls brush their teeth prior and after the party. Here are my “tooth fairies”; I just love this picture!

At the actual party, Fairy Pirate Lauren was still a bit shy but Fairy Pirate Jocey got stuck in and had a wonderful time joining in with the big children. They both had a wonderful time – the party was incredibly well thought out and the games were really well organised – well done to Oliver’s Mummy Amie for throwing two fabulous parties for the children!

I think the full social calendar has been lovely for them but also quite tiring. There have been quite a few days recently where the children were just happy to relax a bit and maybe have a bit of a sleep on the sofa.

It’s a long week for them (as they go to nursery full time) and they are busy too when they are there, so I guess I am not surprised that sometimes they just want to stay at home to play. Here are the girls doing some very good sharing and playing together on Jocey’s portable toy stove, which they both love (it makes the most fantastic sizzling sounds!).

We’re beginning to realise that it’s not only Lauren who is artistic (Lauren’s pictures are really fab for a four year old, as this recent work of art demonstrates). Incidentally, Lauren later revised that drawing to show me with the rest of the family in the garden (clearly after I had been released from kitchen duties).

Jocey’s artistic streak has also been coming to the fore. She’s really beginning to enjoy painting as much as Lauren. Here’s the wonderful canvas that she painted at her friend Georgia’s party.

And this one she drew at nursery to raise money for charity. Of course, being dutiful parents, we bought it at the charity auction. I love her bold brush strokes and her use of colour!

She has also felt the need to do a spot of redecorating about the house. Clearly, there just wasn’t enough bold colour in the kitchen. Two Saturdays ago, I went into the kitchen mid-morning to discover this:

I was doubled over laughing!

Fortunately, I could see the funny side because it wasn’t permanent marker, it wasn’t on the wall or floor and was instead on a fully wipeable surface!

Both girls have gone to bed slightly early tonight because they are tired. Fortunately, they’ve both settled in their own beds; they have been a bit unsettled on and off and coming into our bed – like this.

Not much room left for Jase or me; we had to shift them back once they were properly asleep!

I think we are all looking forward to the Christmas break. Work has been mad for both of us and I’ve just spent two “days off” trying to finish our departmental guidelines. Considering I’ve been trying to update them from about June, it’s been a long haul (it’s now over 280 pages and 66,000 words!).

Not long to go now though and additionally having both resigned from work, we are looking forward to drawing a line under this chapter of our lives and moving on. Funny to think that it will be our last Christmas in the UK and that the whole process has taken us a year to get to this stage. I suspect the rest of the time will fly by now.

Jocey talking to Grandma and Granddad

2009-12-04T20:51:00.001+11:00

Here is another little video for you.

YouTube
- Jocey Hello

Lauren trying on her Mary Outfit

2009-11-27T08:21:00.003+11:00

I have been trying out our new video camera. Here is our first effort.

YouTube
- Lauren as Mary

Who ate all the pies?

2009-11-22T01:59:00.001+11:00

Most people who know me probably realise that I am almost fanatical about my food. I always try to explain that this is part of my cultural heritage, that it is an inherently Cantonese thing (to the point that the standard greeting between Cantonese friends tends to involve asking if they’ve eaten yet, or similar) but the truth of it is that I’m probably just plain obsessed.

However, it can’t just be any old food. It’s got to tickle the taste buds, be interesting and preferably with some provenance. I love nose to tail eating, am passionate about seasonal, local produce and proper animal welfare but am not a vegetarian. Giving the animals we eat as food a decent quality of life should be a matter of course but I certainly don’t see why I should stop eating them as long as I do what I can to ensure that I buy responsibly and respect where the food comes from.

I love making things from scratch and very rarely buy anything pre-cooked or ready-made. I just don’t like not knowing what’s in my food or where it comes from. And more often that not, if you have a careful look at the label on the back (if you can make out the tiny writing) you’ll discover all sorts of E-numbers lurking, as well as surprising (and disturbing) quantities of fat, salt and sugar.

However, recently I bought a small ready made pie from our local Waitrose (I love Waitrose). Maybe there is some truth that in a recession people seek comfort food (though the food in that article is definitely not my kind of food!). I thought it might be a good lunch for us at the weekend.

The pie I bought was the Chicken of Aragon Pie from Pieminister, an award winning Bristol company who insist on using the best and freshest ingredients for their hand made pies. Obviously, I checked the small print at the back. No e-numbers, no odd ingredients or preservatives and free range chicken in the pie. Ticked all the boxes so far; what about the taste?

I cannot praise it enough. It was an absolutely heavenly pie with crisp, light pastry and a succulent, tasty filling. Not only were the chicken chunks tasty, but I could actually taste the vegetables as well.

I definitely could have eaten the whole one to myself; shame I had to share it with Jase. I think he was thinking the exact same thing…

I am going to buy two more this weekend. For those not fortunate enough to live across the road from Waitrose, they are also selling these in Tesco and Sainsbury’s. Roll on comfort food!

Opera for Pre-school Children?

2009-11-22T00:45:00.000+11:00

If you had told me before I had the children that a really good idea for children’s TV would be a series of short 25 minute operas or operettas, I would have laughed. What a bizarre idea; surely it wouldn’t work!

Ok, I was wrong.

My children have just discovered The Wonder Pets, a cartoon where most of the dialogue is sung – in essence a 25 minute operetta. They are completely hooked. Jocelyn in particular adores the Wonder Pets. All this week, she has been singing the phrase “What’s going to work?” after which I get a chorus of “Teamwork!” from both children. They have also just about figured the words to the theme song.

YouTube
- Wonderpets Theme Song

It might even start to challenge the joint untouchable supremacy of Dora and Diego…

As with the best children’s TV, the plots are cleverly written and there is always something there for the adults as well. I can’t complain; they love to sing along. And from Dora and Diego, they have learnt about all kinds of animals (nursery were very surprised when, aged 2, Lauren correctly identified a picture of a humpback whale!) and know a surprising number of Spanish words.

Speaking of which, they have also recently started watching Kai-Lan, a cartoon which is all about the adventures of a little Chinese girl who speaks both English and Mandarin Chinese. I’m really pleased that they have picked up some words (and so have I – I don’t speak any Mandarin, only Cantonese Chinese) and are learning a bit about their heritage.

Some of these characters provide great role models; Daddy Pig from the Peppa Pig is Jase’s hero!

Sunday Cooking Marathon

2009-11-16T09:00:00.000+11:00

Every Sunday, I spend several hours cooking. Some weeks I spend two to three hours and other weeks it is more like five or six hours, depending on the number of meals I am making in advance and their complexity. I try to have all the meals for the working week cooked and also to prepare all our lunches for the week in advance.

There are many reasons behind this but the main one is to save time and money. It is often between 6pm and 6:30pm before we get home on a weekday (often I am even later than this) and the girls are tired. They want to be fed immediately, bathed and put to bed otherwise tempers start to fray (and we get tantrums). There is only really time to do a bit of reheating, rather than cooking from scratch.

Additionally, buying ready made stuff is neither satisfying to the palate nor to the wallet. Despite our jobs, money is still tight (costs of living in London, childcare for two children 5 days a week balanced with being low down on our respective pay scales) and we still scrimp and save at every opportunity. Besides, I come from a family where no matter how busy my parents were, there was a proper meal for the entire family to sit down to in the evening. A very Chinese tradition.

Thus the need for the cooking marathon. Last week, I hadn’t had the time to make our lunches and spent about £25 on some rather limp and bland sandwiches. Ouch!

Today, I prepared a fantastic beer braised beef casserole, some herb and chilli marinated lamb cutlets (which were wolfed down by the whole family – not a scrap left) and a beef and vegetable pasta in a tomato and mascarpone sauce. At some point this week, I still have to roast the five spice pork shoulder (a firm family favourite – it has the most amazing crackling if you have good quality meat and get the temperatures right) and steam my organic chicken (another family favourite – steamed white chicken with a spring onion garnish). I’ll probably do that on Tuesday. Thus most of my weekend seems to fly by without much opportunity for real rest; however, it’s always good to know that we’ll eat well during the week without putting in too much more effort.

Today, Lauren drew me a picture. She was really proud of it and I was thrilled to receive it.

It’s of the house she’d like to live in. She explained to me that it was a big house, with enough bedrooms for all of us to have one each (I guess that it’s a four bedroom house then!) and a playroom in the centre (the round window) for the girls. I asked her what was happening outside; she explained that on the left was a playground next to the house. In the playground was (from left to right) Jocey, Lauren and Daddy. On the right was Mummy’s garden.

“Where’s Mummy then?” I asked, slightly puzzled. She pointed at the pink window on the ground floor. “Mummy, you’re in the kitchen cooking,” she replied proudly.

Go figure!

Party, Party, Party!

2009-11-14T11:46:00.001+11:00

The party season is well underway and over the last month or so, the girls have had a very active social life going to all their friend’s parties. They seem to have had great fun in the process. We’re busy most weekends as a result!

The first party of the season was attended by Jocelyn – she was invited to her best friend's Georgia’s birthday party. One evening in October, I happened to ask Jocey (the first time I had asked – at the time I asked I wasn’t even sure that she would be able to answer the question) who her friends were. Her response (and she says this every time now!) was “Err…Lucas…Georgia…Georgia…Lauren…”. Georgia is obviously of such importance that she gets mentioned more than once!

Georgia’s brave Mummy and Daddy invited lots of little toddlers to their house for a painting party. It was a lovely party, very well run and the children enjoyed it immensely. Jocey wasn’t at all shy and was in playing with the other children in no time.

Here is my beautiful girl painting her masterpiece. I was really surprised by her use of colours and her bold brush strokes. At home previously, her drawings have been mainly scribbles with pencils. Maybe she enjoys painting more than drawing!

Once she had finished that canvas, she moved on to do another painting at the easel. She liked using the bigger brushes in particular.

Before this, I had never considered that she might be artistic. I had always assumed that Lauren (who has always liked drawing and painting and is now very good at it) was the artistic one.

Here’s one of little Georgia (with the bunches), about to blow out her candles. Every time I see her, she is asking for Jocey – how lovely!

That weekend was also Daddy’s birthday on the Sunday. Grandma and Granddad came down from York to help us celebrate. We recently discovered a lovely children’s playground by the river in St Margarets (which is in a great position because we walk down to the river, feed the ducks, walk across the bridge and then to the park) so we took the grandparents there to show them.

Lauren and Jocey love the pirate boat in the playground.

We ended up playing a game of chase where I became a scary crocodile and they were in the relative safety of their boat (unless they decided they wanted to go for a “swim” / run off the boat!). They thought it was hilarious and there was a great deal of laughing and high pitched squealing.

Both Jocey and Lauren tired themselves out running madly about but clearly loved it.

I think both girls were sad to leave the playground when we decided it was time to go back to Richmond for some lunch. We stopped at Wagamama’s for some noodles, which everyone enjoyed.

Once back at home, preparations were being made for Daddy’s birthday celebration. Lauren had helped me make the cake and loved the opportunity to decorate it with chocolate sprinkles – her favourite! I don’t think Daddy objected either, to be honest. Mummy brought it out to the table for all to see, where a certain little girl was already waiting in anticipation…

Lauren was patiently waiting for me to cut the cake. Her T-shirt says it all, in case there was ever any doubt.

It is possible that Daddy was also getting a little impatient and wanted some cake too!

Here’s the family at the celebration and after the presents were opened.

I particularly love this photo of Jocey with her Grandma.

Here is Mummy and Lauren having a cuddle. We all had a lovely time that weekend.

Lauren has been to a string of parties. Here she is at her friend Lorenzo’s party, the following weekend. She is sitting next to Scarlett and opposite Lorenzo and the “other” Lauren in her nursery class, Lauren Williams.

These pictures are from the same boy’s party this time last year. I can’t believe it’s only been a year and how much they’ve all grown in that time! In the picture below, Lauren is sitting next to the lad who was her best friend at the time, Cameron. Cameron has subsequently left the nursery but Lauren still talks about him from time to time.

This was Lorenzo last year with his Mummy, Natalia.

Despite being a year older, Lauren is still painfully shy at these parties. I’m not sure why this is (she’s always been like that when she encounters new situations). She knows most of the children at these parties really well as she goes to nursery with them but somehow is still scared by the unfamiliar setting. It is strange to see her like this when I know she is confident and happy at nursery.

That weekend, she also went to her friend Sophie’s party. She was quite tired by the time the party came around so took a long time before she would leave my side and join in with the other children. Sophie came over straight away to say hello when we arrived – she and Lauren were good friends at nursery. Sadly, she is not at the nursery any more either. Most of Lauren’s friends from the last year at nursery have either left for school or gone to other childcare arrangements.

I got into quite a surprising conversation whilst at the party.

I got talking with Lauren William’s Mummy, who was also there and discovered that she was Australian from Sydney. Naturally, we started talking about our time previously in Sydney in 2002 and are upcoming plans to return. Bizarrely, it emerged in conversation that she used to work in the same company as Jase did in Sydney, and for the same team but on a different floor! And of course, we both had daughters in 2005 that we decided to call Lauren. She told me that they are also thinking of returning to Sydney at some point, but cannot in the next year or so due to her husband’s work commitments.

What a bizarre thing!

Last weekend, Lauren went to Leah’s party. She looked really beautiful in her Princess outfit and her Princess crown. She loved flouncing about in her long dress! Here is a picture of all the children at Leah’s Pirates and Princesses party, after Leah’s Daddy bravely rounded up all the children and got them to stand still long enough to take a photo! Herding cats did spring to mind at one point, but his perseverance paid off.

Lauren is standing next to Oliver, who is in her class, and Georgia who is Oliver’s little sister and Jocey’s best friend. Next to them is Leah, who looked lovely in her Princess outfit. Next to her is Anna Maria, a boy whom I didn’t know, Scarlett and Sophie (who had the previous party) in the red and yellow dress. Lauren and Leah are good friends at nursery and often play together, along with Lauren’s friend Lila.

I could see from the party that the other girls were full of confidence and mixed and played easily together, even though they were seeing each other out of context. Lauren, as always, was terribly shy and took a while to get involved in the play. Perhaps some of the other children see each other outside of nursery on play dates so were more comfortable with each other to begin with. Perhaps that is the disadvantage of being a full-time working mum.

Despite all this, she did seem to be happy when she left each of the parties and did seemed to have enjoyed herself. I am sure she will get used to all of this in time! My little shy Lauren!

Glorious Devon for our Jocelyn!

2009-11-11T10:28:00.001+11:00

I confess that it has been two months since I last blogged. Life has been so crazy that we haven’t had time to stop – the weeks have just hurtled by. It is a shame as so much has been happening but I am hoping that I’ll be able to recall most things. I think that ultimately I do enjoy keeping a diary – I did as a child – and perhaps this blog is an extension of that. Shared memories have always been really important to my family; thus we are a family who love to tell stories and laugh over photographs of past adventures.

At present, we are well into the party season and almost every weekend has seen some celebration for the girls or their friends.

This is mainly an account of the time up to our holiday in Devon, where we celebrated Jocelyn’s second birthday.

August

The weekend before the nasty outbreak of E. coli at farms in Surrey, we went to one such farm (but not any of the ones involved in the outbreak) because we’d been promising the girls we’d go see some farm animals for weeks. So on the last Bank Holiday weekend in August, we set out for Bockett’s Farm.

It was a Saturday lunchtime but as we got within a mile of the farm, we encountered a nasty road traffic accident on the road. As we drove past the scene at low speed, I could see that there was only one paramedic on scene who had just arrived moments before. I asked Jase to pull over so that I could see if he needed any help.

An hour and a half later and after trying to save the injured man along with five paramedics and the air ambulance doctor and paramedic, we were finally done at scene and leaving the Police to start their investigation. It had been unexpected and stressful but I was glad that I was able to help in some way. Unfortunately, I was then in no fit state to go on to the Farm as I needed a change of clothes, so we headed back home.

The next morning, we tried the journey again, this time with no unexpected diversions. The road looked so different without the debris from the crash – almost as if it had never happened. I found that quite odd somehow.

However, once we’d arrived all thoughts of the previous day were forgotten and we had a wonderful time at the farm.

Here are Lauren and Jocey looking at the small animals in the hutch. Lauren was quite nervous, even of the small animals. Jocelyn, as usual, wasn’t scared of anything.

After looking at the rabbits, guinea pigs, sheep, goats and cows in the shed, we went outside to have a ride on the tractor around the farm.

It was all very well organised. There were plenty of hand washing facilities (and of course I made sure their hands were clean after they had touched the animals) and the place looked generally clean. It was all a lot of fun and the animals looked happy and content.

After a good lunch, we headed to the children’s playground area for the girls to run around and play. They especially liked the huge sandpit, complete with play house and sand toys!

Of course, Jocey loved the slide and had many goes before she could be persuaded to try something else.

Lauren spotted the bouncy pillow and the shoes immediately came off and she was on it bounce to her heart’s content!

Despite being quite a cold and overcast day they had a fantastic time and loved seeing the animals.

September

September brought a much needed holiday. Neither of us had actually had a proper summer holiday (our break in July was used to move house to Richmond). Work had been pretty busy for both of us and we were looking forward to going away.

I had found a lovely self catering cottage on the internet in North Devon which could accommodate all of us (as both sets of parents and Aunty Madge were coming too) and since I’d always wanted to go to the West Country, I thought it would be ideal.

It was in the most beautiful setting in North Devon; quiet, peaceful and so green. The cottage was located just outside a small town called Bideford, only accessible via a very narrow (and sometimes hair-raising) country lane.

It was everything we could have hoped for – not just picturesque but obviously a well loved family home. Our whole family loved it – the girls ran round the house for the first two hours exploring every nook and cranny of their “holiday house”.

Every evening, we had wonderful family meals in the farmhouse kitchen. I even got to grips with the challenge of cooking on an AGA (not my favourite beast – I love the instant control and intense heat that only a gas hob can provide). Catering for seven adults and two children was no small challenge, but actually one I enjoyed whilst on holiday.

On the first Sunday after our arrival in Devon, it was Jocelyn’s second birthday. She has yet to have a birthday celebration at home – last year, we were in Chicago for her first birthday!

Here is a picture of my baby girl just a few days old in September 2007.

This is her last year in Chicago on her first birthday.

I can barely believe how quickly she has grown into a little girl. Here she is on her second birthday in Devon. She is just about to blow out the candles on the carrot cake that I had baked for her that morning. I found the recipe in an old WI cookbook at the cottage dating back to the 1950’s. It was a fantastic recipe – I have used it a number of times since!

Jocelyn is turning into such a bright, vivacious girl – full of smiles and laughter!

She is so different from Lauren in personality but somehow they complement each other perfectly. We love our girls so much; they have brought so much joy into our lives. We are lucky and grateful that they also love each other very much.

Whilst in Devon, we visited some of the local attractions and sights. We had a day on another farm, called The Big Sheep, which was enormous fun. We had a day meeting the lovely farm animals, including feeding the lambs.

Lauren was a bit scared because the lambs were pretty boisterous but Jocey wasn’t fazed. She even went to stroke the lambs afterwards, and seemed to like that. Rigorous hand washing followed, of course. I was very impressed by the levels of hygiene in the place – there were signs everywhere reminding people to wash their hands and their children’s hands after any contact with the animals and it was generally very clean.

We loved watching the sheep dogs and also enjoyed the horse whispering demonstration. The girls also loved playing in the huge indoor soft play area.

They played happily in this area for at least an hour and a half before we could tear them away for some lunch.

Here’s Lauren, Jocey and Mummy coming down the big slide with Daddy looking on from the top.

Whilst in Devon, we visited a number of the local attractions. On a wet Monday morning, we drove into Cornwall to the Eden Project. Set in an old quarry, I found it to be surprisingly beautiful.

It was architecturally amazing – a perfect blend of sculpture with an industrial undertone and nature in all its glory. The planting was lush and felt natural; you would not have guessed that it’s only about 10 years old.

The girls did enjoy looking around the domes, especially the rainforest one (even though the heat was quite oppressive). Lauren especially liked the cocoa tree (when she found out that’s where chocolate came from!) and the banana tree with real bananas growing on it. I learned something too – I didn’t realise that pineapples grew on squat bushes; I had always assumed they grew on trees. Perhaps that was the fault of all those inaccurate Del Monte adverts when I was a child!

Both sets of parents enjoyed it too. We all agreed that it had been a lovely outing and well worth seeing. I thought that it was educational with a strong conservational message without being boring. I especially liked the cafe, where all the vegetable produce was grown on site by the Eden Project team.

Being real foodies, we decided that no trip to Devon and Cornwall would be complete without a trip to Padstow, home to chef Rick Stein. I planned to try some seafood there (being a port) even if it wasn’t going to be at his restaurant. Besides, I could always drool at the menu in the window.

It was a glorious day but I was shocked that on a Thursday after the schools had gone back from the summer break that the place was absolutely jam packed with tourists. Despite this, we did eventually find a restaurant called Pescadou which served us a wonderful seafood lunch at a reasonable price. My fish was cooked to perfection. I didn’t get to enjoy it for very long though, as Jocey was in a bad mood and had to be taken for a walk along the harbour before she calmed down.

A chocolate ice cream got her back to her normal cheery self very quickly after that!

Lauren, of course had one too.

In the afternoon, we drove back towards North Devon and stopped to take in the sights at Tintagel. Being a fan of the Arthurian Legends since childhood, I achieved a lifetime ambition to see Tintagel.

It is set in the most amazing place; you walk down a very steep path which takes you down a narrow valley and out towards an isolated headland, buffeted by the sea.

To clarify, the ruins that you see are mainly from a castle built in the Middle Ages. However, out on the headland, archaeologists uncovered ruins dating from a 5th or 6th century fort, the correct timeframe for the legends of Arthur. We loved it; the atmosphere and the sheer wild nature of it.

We had unexpectedly glorious weather for the entire week so much of it was spent on the beach. The girls loved this; they spent the whole time running around and building sandcastles. It was fantastic to see them so happy and so free – a far cry from London.

We found two beaches that we particularly loved; one at Instow, which was very sheltered and family friendly and one at Woolacombe, which was huge, very clean and had excellent facilities.

Here’s Lauren and Jocey on the beach at Instow building sandcastles.

Here’s a later masterpiece getting the “Jocey treatment”.

The girls are clearly having fun!

This is Mummy’s attempt at sand sculpture – a sea turtle. Pretty basic but drew many admirers from people passing by on the beach!

Our day at Woolacombe was also fun filled. The girls had a wonderful time doing a dance around their sandcastle – perhaps to bring out the sun?

What better way to celebrate the joys of the beach than for the whole family to enjoy a lunch of fish and chips in the sunshine? I had some fresh whelks as well…yummy!!

It was a fantastic day out, as you can see by everyone’s relaxed smiles.

We attempted some family photos but unfortunately the girls were too tired by then. This was the only one we managed to get successfully!

We loved Devon and we loved our holiday there. The week was over far too quickly (as always with holidays). We were truly sad to be heading back to the concrete jungle of London. The quieter pace was something I definitely continue to yearn for, and maybe we’ll find soon. I would definitely like to go back some day.

The rest of our holiday photos can be seen here.

The Big Fish Tank

2009-09-02T06:17:00.000+10:00

We’ve had a number of successful days out from Richmond over the past few weeks.

One weekend at the end of July, we went on the train to Waterloo to the London Aquarium. We had been promising the girls that we would go to see the “big fish tank” for some time and they were very excited about going. Even the train journey was lots of fun for them and they kneeled on the seats to look out the windows to point at other passing trains along the way.

We got there relatively early, but despite this there were already hoards of people in central London. The queue for the London Eye was already massive. Here’s Daddy and the girls outside the Aquarium.

Lauren had recently watched a “Happy Monster Band” episode on Playhouse Disney where the band go to London and see the London Eye, Big Ben and meet the Queen, so she was really excited to see Big Ben and the Eye in real life.

No show for Queenie though…

Here’s Jocelyn and Daddy; Jocey’s clearly eager to go in as she’s pointing to the Aquarium!

We didn’t have much of a queue for tickets at the Aquarium but unfortunately we were kept a long time at the desk as the girl could not work out which pre-paid ticket we’d bought. So much for pre-paying!

It was our first time at the Aquarium and the girls loved it, although Lauren (as usual) was a bit scared of the bigger fish like the rays. There was an open tank inside about halfway through where you could get really close to the fish and see them from above. Poor Lauren got really frightened when one of the rays rose up out of the water towards her to have a closer look. She wouldn’t believe me when I told her they were nice fish with big smiley faces!

Once she got over that though she seemed to enjoy the rest of it, especially seeing “Nemo” and “Dorey” and the sharks. Jocey, meanwhile took it all in her stride and wasn’t scared of anything.

At the end of the trip, there was the obligatory stroll around the gift shop. Jocey fell in love with a cuddly Nemo and asked to take him home. Bizarrely, for a girl who was scared of the big fish, Lauren chose the cuddly shark (now called Bruce) in the toy shop at the exit – go figure!

Lauren’s 4th Birthday

2009-09-01T08:58:00.000+10:00

I am slowly catching up with recent events; it has been so hectic that I’ve barely had time to catch my breath. I can’t believe that two weeks have passed since Lauren’s birthday and that I haven’t been able to blog about it until now.

Mind you, in that time I’ve been to Australia and back, but more about that later.

The birthday girl had known for some time that she was coming up to her fourth birthday and mentioned it quite often. She talked about the party she was going to have (with all the family there, of course) and the cake that she wanted (chocolate, with Dora the Explorer on it – a bit of a challenge for poor Mummy!). She was really excited as the day got closer and the family started to arrive.

Peter and Suzanne stayed with us in the flat and my parents stayed in Kingston as the flat isn’t big enough to accommodate both sides of the family at once. The children were thrilled to see everyone here in our new home. Both sets of parents have been impressed with our new flat – smaller but perfectly formed, and our new surroundings in lovely Richmond.

We decided to have a big meal out with the whole family on the Saturday night and went into Putney to the original Royal China there. We had an enjoyable meal even though some aspects of it were not as good as the newer Bayswater one.

Lauren’s fourth birthday was on the Sunday. Recently, I bought a Cobb barbeque to try out as we only have a small balcony as outdoor space and it is so compact. We lit the coals and prepared a large birthday feast – this is fast becoming a tradition on her birthday.

Here’s our journey with her in pictures. This is my beautiful girl on the day she was born, in August 2005. She was so tiny as she was only 34 weeks and was 4lb 3oz (1.9kg)!

Here’s Lauren on her 1st birthday, looking very excited at the prospect of birthday cake.

Here’s the great barbeque on her 2nd birthday. We had a glorious day as the weather was superb.

Here’s happy Lauren on her 3rd birthday. We were about to bring out the cake at this point!

Here’s my beautiful birthday girl waiting patiently for Mummy to finish icing her cake so that she can open her presents on her 4th birthday.

She is our darling girl and we love her so much!

When the cake was finally finished and brought out (as ordered) I hope it didn’t disappoint. It was moist and gooey inside – just as a chocolate cake should be.

Poor Lauren went a bit shy when we were singing “Happy Birthday” to her and retreated to Mummy for a big hug. After this, she opened her presents, which she clearly enjoyed.

As you can see, the birthday girl loves her princesses, so a fairy princess outfit suited her just fine. She wore this for most of the day!

When Aunty Charlotte, Uncle Jason and George arrived, they had also suspected that Lauren might enjoy being a fairy princess. Lauren was thrilled to get this second outfit, with even bigger wings! A girl can’t have too many…

With barbeque food flying off the tiny but wonderfully efficient Cobb, the day was a huge success. Lauren had a wonderful time, and the grown-ups did too.

Exactly six days to go before we do it all again for Jocey’s second birthday, as their birthdays are only three weeks apart. I’m keen to give Jocelyn a really good birthday this year as last year we only had a small celebration and then had a long plane journey.

This year, we’ll be with the whole family in Devon and Cornwall; we’re renting a beautiful 16th century thatched farmhouse. It will be the first time we’ve ventured that far into the South West – can’t wait!

Life in Richmond

2009-09-01T07:58:00.000+10:00

I am finally back blogging after a significant break – it may even been the longest period I’ve had where I haven’t blogged. Swine flu is just a distant memory now – although Jocelyn also caught it (bizarrely, not from Jase) and was quarantined too.

We went offline shortly after my last post because of the house move. There was a frantic push towards the finish line as the move date edged closer, but we finally managed to get all our stuff ready for long term storage and the house ready to be packed by the removal men.

On the morning of the house move in mid July, the girls got up for the last time in their bedroom.

Here they are in their beds in their room. Most of their stuff had already been packed away and this meant that it had already been depersonalised to some degree. However, I did feel sad for them as it’s been the only home either of them have ever known.

Despite this, they seemed genuinely excited when they said their goodbyes to the house and I promised them that they would go to the new house when they came home from nursery.

The removal men came and with great efficiency packed all our remaining stuff and loaded the vans ready for the trip to long term storage and our new flat in Richmond. Since the flat is smaller than old house, we had already decided that much of what we had would need to go into long term storage and only brought back out when we move to a bigger permanent home.

The move actually went very smoothly although it took most of the afternoon for them to unload our stuff at the other end and lug it up to our second floor flat. They worked very hard and were really good – I’d definitely use them again. Of course, that was only the beginning. It took me a good week and a half to get the flat organised, tidy and in good working order – a lot of hard work. However, by the end of the first afternoon, the girls’ bedroom was ready for their return and we had a functioning kitchen and living room, which I think was a huge achievement.

The girls returned home and were absolutely thrilled. They loved going up and down in the lift and they were really excited to find their bedroom almost exactly like their old room (smaller, but with their furniture in a very similar layout to the old room). The familiarity helped them see that the flat was our home now and they settled in quickly. We even brought some of our pot plants with us to put on our balcony, which Lauren then immediately recognised as “Mummy’s Garden”.

For about two weeks, they were a bit unsettled at night and were anxious when they awoke and didn’t recognise their surroundings (which was a good excuse for climbing into bed with Mummy and turning Daddy out into the spare bedroom). However, that settled down as well and they are now really at home in our new flat.

Mid July was also George’s first birthday. Charlotte and Jason had planned a big party with their friends and family at a venue in Hammersmith. My parents came down to stay with us in Richmond but the Friday before his birthday weekend, Jocey contracted swine flu and was placed in quarantine by our GP. This meant that sadly she and I missed out on the big party. Jase, Lauren and my parents went and took some pictures for me to see.

Here’s the birthday boy with Charlotte and Jason. He’s clearly looking forward to his birthday cake!

Lauren having hugs with her Gung Gung at the party, and probably looking forward to the cake too.

Here’s the birthday boy playing with Lauren and my mum. They are clearly having a lot of fun.

When Jocey was declared safe to join the world again, we made the most of our free weekends and explored Richmond from our new home. Our flat is in a fabulous position, right in the heart of town but off the main street where the pubs and train station are. This means it’s convenient but we don’t have drunks or much noise at night. This was a major factor in choosing this property for renting – great location and functional layout inside. As Richmond is so compact, everything is within easy reach and we rarely take the car except to go further afield or to go to work.

Here we are at our new local playground, a lovely small park in Worple Way. The girls are trying out the swings and having a great time.

The girls giggling on the swings!

Here’s Jocelyn playing with the football on another occasion. She’s very good on her feet and is showing some sporting promise!

This one was taken at Old Deer Park, a little further away, but also with a great children’s play area. It is a huge expanse of green next to the river – good to end up there after going down to the river to feed the ducks!

Jocey enjoying the climbing frame.

Lauren also having fun on the climbing frame.

Head first down the slide! Wee!!

After any trip to the park, a big ice cream is mandatory. Lucky that there is just such a place across the road from the new flat. Bliss.

What more could a girl want?

Our other Richmond photos can be found on my Flickr account here and here.

Days of our lives

2009-07-01T09:00:00.000+10:00

I’m pleased to report that Jase has recovered from his brush with swine flu. He was in quarantine all of last week but after starting Tamiflu made a speedy recovery.

We’ve had the opportunity to deal with approximately 30 years of photographs over the last two weekends as part of our packing and sorting. We found an excellent company on the internet who take all your old photos and scan them into digital copies.

We sent them approximately 2000 photos from 30 years (unfortunately excluding ones already in photo albums as I had packed these already) and within three days they had scanned them and returned them to us with the photos on a DVD. Through this method, we were able to save these precious photos from further degradation in quality.

I am so pleased with the result! We looked through the photos and it brought back so many memories, but frustratingly we also realised how much we’d already forgotten. I’m hoping these memories will come back when we look at the photos again.

We have begun to build our photo archive here on Flickr. I will need to get Jase to dig out some of his baby photos the next time we are in York.

Ruby Wedding celebration

2009-07-01T08:35:00.001+10:00

Four weekends ago, we headed up to York to celebrate my in-law’s Ruby Wedding anniversary. Suzanne and Peter had invited their close friends and wider family to help them celebrate the occasion. My parents headed down from Edinburgh for the weekend as they were invited too.

We were a little worried on the way up as the weather hadn’t been all that great and the forecast was for a cold and grey day. I hurriedly unpacked all the summer clothes that I had originally packed and repacked for a colder day before leaving London.

We arrived close to midnight on the Thursday night, so went straight to bed on arrival. The following day, we helped Suzanne and Peter get ready for the big day by preparing food and doing odd jobs.

On the Friday evening, a large marquee was erected in the back garden. We were amazed at the speed with which it went up considering at that time the heavens opened and it was pouring with rain.

On Saturday, Suzanne’s family started to arrive. It was lovely to meet them for the first time and get to know them a bit. My parents also arrived that afternoon, so we spent a lovely evening as an extended family out at a local Chinese restaurant called Maxi’s.

This is Suzanne with two of her sisters. Jase also got to meet one of his cousins for the first time.

The girls are enjoying hugs with their other grandparents in this photo.

The girls can be a bit fussy at times about their food when we go out to eat but fortunately they were both on best behaviour. They both enjoyed their noodles and had some crispy duck and stir fried beef. I thought both girls looked lovely in their little party dresses.

This photo is of Jocey giving Aunty Madge a cuddle – I thought it was really lovely!

The day of the anniversary party turned out thankfully to be dry. The finishing touches were added to the marquee making it look fantastic.

The guests started to arrive, including Suzanne’s brother and another sister that we had not met before. It was fabulous seeing these long-lost siblings reunited at such a happy occasion. Here they are at one of the family tables.

Everyone helped themselves to drinks and before long a real party atmosphere was underway! This is the magnificent marquee in their back garden.

Lauren and Jocey also got to meet all their second cousins. They played really well together (maybe because they were all girls!) and had a fantastic time. Lauren especially loved playing with Alice, who is a similar age. Here’s Lauren with Georgina (aged eight) and Alice (aged four), the children of Oliver (Jason’s cousin) and Caroline. This was taken after they had finished playing balloon tennis with me in the living room.

Little Lara (aged two) was also there with her parents Janet (Jason’s cousin) and David. She was too little to join in the more boisterous play of the older girls but seemed to enjoy herself nevertheless.

We all sat down to eat the fabulous hog roast before long. The food was wonderful as the hog was done to perfection. My only regret is that the caterers took away all the leftover hog roast, including an awful lot of excellent crackling. When Jase went to get me seconds, he omitted to get any crackling for me and when I next looked, the hog had been packed away. What a missed opportunity!!

We sat with Jase’s cousins Janet, Claire, Oliver, Jo and their partners. There was a lot of talk about babies and children at our table. We all had a great time catching up; I especially enjoyed chatting with Caroline about our lives with two children.

The girls all had a little table to themselves adjacent to ours. Initially, this was only meant for the three older girls but Jocey soon decided that she was not going to sit with Mummy and Daddy and would rather sit with Lauren, Georgina and Alice. Extra chairs were quickly produced!

Lauren and Georgina then began to look after the younger children, looking after them and being Mummy to them. Lauren was feeding Jocey and Lara chocolate cake in this photo. Good sharing!

Both Peter and Suzanne had the opportunity to speak and talk about their time together and their happiness that they had their family and friends all around them to help them celebrate their special day.

The girls enjoyed themselves immensely and were very well behaved. We were so proud of them. As they got on so well with their second cousins, we promised Caroline and Oliver that we would make every effort to see them and their girls again in the near future.

The grown ups were pretty tired out by the end after a day of entertaining the children but it had been a truly memorable day. Here’s Dad catching forty winks on the sofa with Jocey and Octpu.

All Peter and Suzanne’s hard work in organising the event led to everyone having an absolutely fantastic time, as well as raising a sizable sum for one of the local children’s hospices. I am certain that everyone there will remember it fondly in the years to come. Most importantly, they themselves were relaxed and had a wonderful time, despite all the work they had to put in behind the scenes!

The family photos from the day can be found here.

Moving to Richmond

2009-07-01T01:18:00.001+10:00

At the end of last week, we finally exchanged contracts on our house and have set a date for moving out! We were absolutely thrilled to have sold our house in 7 weeks despite the current housing market and additionally to get what we asked for the house. Our estate agents worked their socks off for us, so all credit to them.

We have had several weekends of sorting and packing, thus the lack of updates online. We finally finished clearing out the loft this weekend, including all the old carpets that had been stacked up there from the year dot. Worryingly, some of them had become a good hiding place for moths so they were quickly taken to the tip. The loft is now gloriously empty; just a shame it wasn’t that way when we moved in ourselves.

It has been really cathartic; we have taken 5 car loads of stuff to the tip and at least 3 car loads to the charity shop. I couldn’t believe some of the stuff that Jase had hoarded over the years in our loft (we’ve only been in this house since the end of 2004 but there was hoarding going on even before that).

The house is chaos as you can imagine; boxes and stuff everywhere, either waiting for packing or having been packed.

I find it a bit difficult to relax in the house at the moment because of this and can’t wait for the move to be all over. However, to be fair, we have done a lot of packing and there isn’t much more to do.

My job for today has been to find a company to clean our house before we hand it over to the new owners. Now I know that some people will wonder why we are bothering but I feel that it should be part of moving out and is a courtesy to your buyer. Our buyers seemed to be really nice people when I met them and have done everything they can to make the exchange a smooth process, which is all the more reason.

Of course, there are also personal reasons for this. This was our very first house together in Bonaly, Edinburgh which Jase and I bought in our final year of university. It didn’t always look this lovely though. This picture was taken when we were preparing to sell it back in 2003.

We moved into the house in February 1997. It had been a really cold and grey day and by the time the move was done it was dark. The previous owner had left the house dirty, had taken everything including the loo roll holders, towel rails and shelves off the walls and left each room with just one 40 watt light bulb (even in the rooms with more than one light fitting). There was also a pile of discarded odds and ends in the garage which she had not bothered to remove.

I remember sitting in the dark front room at the end of that day feeling exhausted and disappointed because it hadn’t been anything like the home I’d expected to move into. Contrast this experience with our move into our current house, where the previous owner left us a bottle of champagne and a friendly note explaining how everything worked. The house had been left tidy, and whilst not super clean, it was still a huge improvement on our experience in Edinburgh.

We take possession of our rental flat in Richmond tomorrow. I was thrilled when I found it as it is just right for our family’s needs at this time. It is right in the heart of Richmond so everywhere is within walking distance and it’s a good size being a post-war flat. I am looking forward to spending Tuesdays and weekends exploring Richmond and Kew; Jase and I are both hoping that it will be less pressured and less hassle than West London, where we’ve been living up to now. Of course, being closer to work and nursery (it’s about 5 minutes drive from our new flat) will be fantastic too.

We can’t wait!

Glorious summer

2009-06-03T02:00:00.000+10:00

The weather has been absolutely glorious for days. At the weekend, we spent a lot of time at the park with the girls as the whole family took advantage of the fabulous weather. Our garden is looking wonderful but is needing a lot of watering as the sun is so fierce during the day. There has been very little rain lately, so it looks like we could have the very hot summer that we’ve been promised by the weathermen.

June is a busy month for all of us. My brother Jase and Charlotte celebrate their second wedding anniversary today. My in-laws celebrate their Ruby wedding anniversary this weekend. We celebrate our 11th wedding anniversary in 3 weekends’ time; that same weekend, my cousin Jeff will be getting married in Toronto. We are really sorry that we won’t be there to help Jeff and Leanne celebrate their special day.

So this weekend, we are all going to York for Suzanne and Peter’s Ruby wedding anniversary. There is a big event planned for Sunday with family and friends, with a hog roast being the centrepiece of the festivities. We are all really looking forward to it and having a long weekend out of London.

Next week, I am going to view some rental accommodation in Richmond for the family, as our house sale appears to be reaching the final stages. We are really pleased to have got here so quickly and can’t wait for everything to be finalised. Moving to Richmond will get us closer to the nursery and make our lives a lot easier as commuting will be less.

Once we are safely settled in Richmond, we intend to kick back and enjoy the glorious summer ahead!

Happy Birthday to Grandma!

2009-06-01T00:55:00.001+10:00

May is a month of birthdays – we had PoPo’s (Grandma Maggie’s) birthday at the beginning of the month and Grandma Suzanne’s birthday today at the end of the month. So just for our two Grandmas, here’s a special rendition of the Birthday Song!

Happy birthday!

James & Sally’s Wedding Photos

2009-05-30T23:19:00.002+10:00

The photos that Jason, Julian and I took are uploading to Jase’s Flickr account as I type.

They will end up here.

We have sent James & Sally a disk with them all on today.

Feel free to share the link around.

String Legacy

2009-05-28T07:31:00.001+10:00

My musical career really began aged 6 or 7 when I first encountered the violin. I remember quite vividly my first Skylark violin; it made quite a squeaky noise and its quality was no doubt the catalyst for many parents prohibiting their offspring from taking their instrumental career any further.

Luckily for me though, my parents persevered with the questionable sound and my string playing eventually led me to playing both violin and viola with orchestras and quartets at school and outside of school. However, as my singing career became more dominant, my chances of playing became less and less and eventually I stopped playing both instruments and concentrated on the singing.

Recently I brought my instruments (which I’ve had for about 20 odd years) down to London as I wanted the opportunity to pick things back up and show the girls what fun stringed instruments were. Lauren in particular was fascinated. However, after a few attempts at playing the instruments, I realised that all those years in storage had affected both the bow and the instrument as the sound didn’t ring quite true.

Last Tuesday, I accidentally found a violin shop in Ealing whilst on a quest to get some sushi. Sadly, the sushi shop was just closing as I got there so I decided to investigate the violin shop instead. After a conversation with one of the staff members, I decided to bring my instruments back to the shop this week for examination, a valuation and an overhaul if necessary.

Luckily for me, the owner was on the premises when I got there and he examined my violin and viola with the kind of attention to detail and knowledge that marked him out to be a real pro. After playing strings for many years, I thought I was fairly knowledgeable about violins and violas, but my knowledge was trivia compared to his depth of knowledge. He makes and restores instruments and actually knew the man who had made my viola, which impressed me no end.

I had been right in thinking that both instruments and bows need a little bit of work to get them back to a good standard, but he reassured me that these were not overly complex as the instruments were in very good condition and structurally sound.

However, when he gave me a rough valuation for my instruments I nearly fainted. They were worth much more than I had expected, even taking into consideration that I have owned them for 20 years.

Once restored, I will definitely be taking better care of my instruments and playing them more. After all, despite having to leave it to one side once the demands of my working life took off, I can definitely say that my musical career brought me a lot of joy and happiness. The instruments will also be a fantastic legacy for the girls, especially if they decide to follow in Mummy’s footsteps and play strings.

“Happee!”

2009-05-28T07:07:00.001+10:00

Jocey is getting really talkative now. We are constantly astounded at her rapid acquisition of new words. My favourite one is “happeeee!”, which is quite apt considering her sunny personality and her constant smiles.

We’ve had two happy Bank Holiday weekends in the last month. On the May Day weekend, we went to Woburn Safari Park on the Saturday and on May Day we ventured out to Kensington Gardens to see the Diana Memorial playground. We hadn’t been before so weren’t quite sure what to expect. However, we liked the sound of the pirate ship there so made the journey out there.

Understandably, it was pretty busy. I overheard one parent remark to another that they had thought it would be a good idea to come but shame that everyone else had thought so too. Despite this, the girls absolutely adored it.

Lauren and Jocey really enjoyed playing on the pirate ship, in the sand pit, on the climbing frames and swings.

It was just a shame that it wasn’t a better day in terms of the weather, as it rained and was overcast. During the worst of the weather we went to the Royal China for Dim Sum and noodles, so it was a good day for everyone. By the end of the day, the girls were worn out but had had a brilliant day. Here’s Jocey having a rest on one of the sheep sculptures; I love this photo!

This Bank Holiday weekend, it was an absolute scorcher. It really felt like summer was well on its way with glorious sunshine both Saturday and Sunday. Monday was sadly more overcast but did brighten up later on.

On the Saturday morning, we headed out to Chiswick quite early (well, early for us anyway) to have breakfast as we had a viewing that morning and another one at lunchtime. Here’s Lauren and Daddy at breakfast.

We love going to Balans for breakfast. We always get good service and we love the booths which make eating out with the children a bit easier. Here’s Jocey and me, taken by Lauren.

They have a big outdoor seating area so it wasn’t surprising that they were really busy. We sat indoors though, so had no problem getting seated.

After breakfast, we headed to a children’s playground in Chiswick to let the girls have a bit of a run around.

They loved the new park and had fun exploring the climbing frames and slides.

Monday saw more park fun at Ravenscourt Park and also some time in the large sandpit there. Much to my surprise, Jocey was initially quite scared in the sandpit and wouldn’t put her feet in the sand. After all the fun that she had had in Lyme Regis, this really surprised me. We had clearly left it too long.

However, after a while, she came round and was soon helping build and destroy sandcastles with glee. Later on, they explored the children’s playground as well.

The outing was finished off with a trip to Gourmet Burger Kitchen. We all definitely had a happy time!

A South Yorkshire Wedding

2009-05-25T02:44:00.001+10:00

Last weekend we went to the wedding of Jason’s oldest friend, James. They first became friends at the age of 4 when they went into Clifton Prep School in York some 32 years ago. They, together with their friends Alex and Julian later went to St Peter’s School in York and are still friends now.

Here’s a picture of the boys together on the day (clockwise from back left – Julian, Jase, James the groom and Alex).

James and Sally had a lovely civil ceremony in one of the hotels in central Huddersfield. They asked Jase to do one of the readings; he was a bit nervous but it all went very well.

It was quite a blustery day in Huddersfield and a mixture of sunshine and showers. We had both been a bit worried as initially the weather forecast was pretty poor. However, the sunshine held out long enough for James and Sally to get some lovely pictures outside, so it all worked out well for them.

Here’s one of James and Sally after the ceremony with their mums.

Everyone thought that Sally looked fabulous on the day. She wore a really classic dress and looked both beautiful and radiant.

Here we are after the ceremony in front of the hotel.

We tucked into a buffet meal later on in the evening and were entertained by the fun speeches. The happy couple then led the dancing as the DJ got his decks going. We sadly had to leave after the first dance to get back to the girls, who were at Grandma and Granddad’s house in York, but we both agreed that it had been a lovely day and a great wedding.

We wish James and Sally every happiness in their new life together!

Congratulations!

2009-05-13T02:13:00.001+10:00

Congratulations to my friends Jill and Mark, who had their third baby at the end of last month! Baby Stephen arrived three weeks early but both mum and baby are doing well and are at home. Strange to think that they were only with us back in February, when they got snowed in.

My favourite picture was this one that they sent me, of Emily, Christopher and the new arrival.

Call of the wild

2009-05-13T02:05:00.000+10:00

On the Bank Holiday weekend, we decided that we’d done enough tidying and cleaning but hadn’t really had enough fun. On Saturday, the weather was glorious, so we decided to go to the safari park at Woburn. The girls were really looking forward to it as we had promised them that we would see lions and elephants in the morning.

After about an hour’s travel, we were at Woburn without too much difficulty. Unfortunately, the ticketing computer decided to crash when we got to the ticket desk and we spent about 10 minutes waiting for the team to sort us out with tickets. However, once this was solved, we were in the park.

The girls got really excited when they saw the big animals. They loved the lions, elephants, giraffes, big oxen and the monkeys.

It was fantastic fun for all of us and we all loved it – adults and children alike. Once we completed the car safari, we had lunch in the child-friendly cafeteria and walked around the foot safari area. They had an afternoon looking at animals (they really liked the kangaroos), playing in the children’s playground and even went for a trip on the miniature railway. Here’s Lauren on the train with Daddy.

They even had time to play at the fun fair at the end of the afternoon before we set off back to London.

On the way back, there was only snoring coming from the back seats; the girls were asleep as soon as we started driving as they had had a fun filled day. We would definitely consider the trip again as it was a really good day out. I was pleasantly surprised at the amount they had there for young children to do – a real bonus!

Fun at the weekend

2009-04-27T05:53:00.002+10:00

Well, this weekend wasn't the complete washout that the weather men predicted and was actually quite lovely.

The girls have been out to the park today with Daddy whilst I was doing my weekly cooking marathon. We all managed to have a relaxing time despite the chores - something we were needing.

Lauren drew this picture for me this weekend.

Apparently the person in purple just left of centre is me! I think her pictures are fab and getting ever more sophisticated.

Jocey also made progress this weekend and said her first sentence this weekend. On waking up on Saturday morning she was playing in the bed for a little while. She put her Octopus under the covers and said "Beh, Otpu! BeyBey!" (translated from Jocey language as "Bed, Octopus! Bye Bye!").

Love it!

Selling our House

2009-04-22T07:29:00.001+10:00

Over the last 7-10 days, I have had a mad time entertaining estate agents. Last week, I invited a few agents to view our house and to give us a valuation. Predictably, these ranged from the totally unbelievable to the probably realistic. In the end, after much deliberation, we didn’t go with the agent who gave us the highest valuation, nor the one with the cheapest rate. The agent we chose came armed with lots of facts and figures, didn’t say anything vague or wishy-washy and didn’t promise anything that he knew he couldn’t actually deliver. He was also the only one who said that he wouldn’t be telling us what we wanted to hear but what was realistic.

I have to say that I have not regretted the decision at all. After informing them that they were the successful ones last Wednesday and signing the paperwork on Thursday, I found myself sorted out with a solicitor for the conveyancing work and with a viewing in hand by Friday. By Saturday, we had had another viewing and an offer made on our house. I was bowled over by their efficiency and fast pace.

Since then, we have had two further viewings and all before the details of our house are even fully available. Yesterday, the photographers were in the house taking the pictures and preparing the floorplans and descriptions. This meant that all last weekend, we were packing, moving boxes and furniture out to storage and cleaning the house from top to bottom. We worked like slaves but I can now say that the house looks absolutely amazing.

Even our estate agents were amazed. They kept saying that they couldn’t believe that it could look so good with two children in the house. They told me it was like a show home because it was so well presented. So far, all the feedback from the viewings has been really positive, with people saying how lovely the finish is on our property.

It is hard, hard work. To keep it in top condition means endless tidying and cleaning after the girls have gone to bed and each morning before going to work (and that means getting up earlier to achieve it). It has to be spotless before I leave as I can get phone calls at the last minute to view the property, and there would be no chance to get back to tidy before it.

It is really stressful because it feels that the house is no longer ours, but if we make this sacrifice and we get the house sold for a good price in this market then I will certainly not be complaining. I’m hoping that we can sell our house and move out before the summer so that we can relax a but once that is done.

On a brighter note, today Jase and I treated ourselves by going out for lunch to the lovely La Trompette in Chiswick. We felt that we deserved it after all the hard work on the house that we've put in recently. It was fantastic and we had great food and a wonderful time.

We are keeping everything crossed; our future depends on this sale going through successfully.

Ongoing developments

2009-04-22T07:03:00.000+10:00

Jocey has suddenly discovered language. She seemed much slower to talk than Lauren but over the last three weeks, she has been learning new words at a phenomenal rate.

She has quite a vocabulary now and seems to be adding several new words every day. For example:

Mame = Mummy

Dada = Daddy

Otpu = Octopus (her favourite soft toy)

Mih = Milk

MehMeh = Dummy (also Lauren’s name for a dummy)

Tuck = Stuck

Noo = No

OoohNooo = Oh No!

AhhGoh = All gone

BehBeh = Bye Bye

SaCho = Sad Choice

The last one in particular had me in stitches. She is great at mimicking us, as I found out this morning. I was telling Lauren off for making a mess in her bedroom and I told her that she was “making a sad choice”. Jocey, who was on the changing mat at the time started saying “SaCho, SaCho, SaCho” over and over again. I was trying my best to keep a straight face but in the end couldn’t help laughing.

It had the desired effect though. Lauren tidied up.

In other things though, Jocey was faster to develop than Lauren at a comparable age. She walked sooner and her ability to understand make-believe is really quite advanced. Last week, Jocey was playing a feeding game with the “babies” that she had put in the pushchair.

I am sure that this is through her constant interaction with Lauren, as Lauren was not quite at the same stage with pretend play at the same age. She copies Lauren a lot (however, this isn’t always a good thing!). For example, this is Jocey at the park last weekend, swinging from the crossbar over the slide like Lauren does. Jocey is fearless in everything that she does!

Here’s the chief monkey showing the apprentice monkey how it should be done.

The girls play well together as Lauren feels that Jocey understands her play. They clearly adore each other.

Jocey is also showing more interest in books now, whereas before she wasn’t really interested. This was a huge contrast to Lauren, who from an early age loved us reading to her. However, the feedback that we get from nursery is that Jocey loves music and dancing most of all!

Lauren is also making huge strides in development lately. Her carers were telling us that she is the best child in her class at writing; they told us that she can consistently write her name in a legible form and they said how impressed they were that she was able to do this. Her speech and its content is also becoming much more sophisticated. Both girls seem to be thriving!

I have uploaded all our recent family videos to Jase’s YouTube page.

Fun with the Grandparents

2009-04-22T05:46:00.001+10:00

I’m aware that we haven’t been posting very often recently but here’s an update of the things we’ve been doing over the last three weeks.

At the beginning of April, Jase’s parents and Aunty Madge came to stay. It was the weekend following my birthday but unfortunately I was on call that week, so wasn’t able to celebrate much. The girls had a great time as usual seeing their grandparents and Suzanne and Peter did a fantastic job with the garden. They helped us by tidying and planting up our tubs to bring colour into the garden.

You can see from the photo that the back garden has really matured from the time when the initial planting was done by our gardener Helen.

I think that it’s turned out really well, and it has been low maintenance just as she promised us.

The front garden also looks lovely with the window boxes that they planted.

Our front entrance has really been brightened up and I love the unusual hanging basket.

After all that hard work, it was decided ice cream was needed and the girls enjoyed theirs hugely!

Jocey developed a large ice cream “beard” whilst eating hers but wouldn’t let any of us clean it off!

On Sunday, it was good to escape the house for a while to have lunch in Sam’s Brasserie in Chiswick. We had a great meal there (as always) and the girls had a good time too. Lauren drew some pictures with Suzanne whilst we were waiting for the food.

Jocey (as always) was impatient for her food and ate her toddler food as well as tucking into Mummy’s food later on.

The following weekend, my mum and dad came to stay over the long Easter weekend. We took the opportunity to do further packing, tidying and sprucing up the house before putting it on the market. The girls had a wonderful time with the grandparents with trips to the park and lots of fun and games. We also had a bit of a family get-together with Jason, Charlotte and George.

Here are the girls after dinner on Easter Day. They found Daddy’s medal (for the best 70’s outfit at a work’s night out!) and had great fun putting it on and taking it off.

Lauren gave the medal to Jocey for being the first to finish her dinner!

By the end of the Easter weekend, we were exhausted but had made really good progress on the house. The girls were really sad to see the grandparents leave on Easter Monday, especially Jocey, who cried for several minutes and pointed at the door demanding to be taken outside after they had left. Lauren was sad but seems to be starting to understand that the idea of a visit and that grandparents come back after a while.

Catch-up with Old Friends

2009-04-01T07:14:00.004+11:00

Whilst away in Manchester for James’ Stag Weekend I had the opportunity to catch up with Gareth and to meet Lindsay for the first time.

We spent a good 5 hours (in a couple of sessions) chatting, and that is one of the prime reasons I am so tired this week! (3 am finishes are outside of my comfort zone now!)

Anyway, we had a great time and here are some photos that I took in Starbucks.

Jase

Rapid catch up…

2009-03-25T11:03:00.003+11:00

I have been chasing my own tail for so long over recent months that I’ve hardly had time to breathe. I’m certain that this adds to the sense of frustration that I have felt on a day to day basis. There seems to be an impossible mountain of tasks to complete and not enough hours in the day.

To add to this, I sprained my back whilst moving boxes over the weekend as some of them were very heavy after I had packed and sealed them. I am trying to keep moving and do some stretches, but it has been a set back in terms of packing today on my day off.

I’ve put the girls into nursery full time so that on my day off I can organise all the house move stuff. Whilst I was a bit reluctant to do this at first, it has certainly allowed me to get things done which are normally impossible. Even at the weekend, we have little opportunity to do chores as the girls are still little and require a lot of our attention. I miss them but console myself that it’s only going to be for a short time until we’ve sorted our move.

I’ve finally got up to date with our photos online – our photos from the last three months are all uploaded and can be seen by clicking the link to my Flickr albums.

Now, highlights from the last three months’ family activities!

New Year

We had a quiet New Year; unfortunately I was working at my hospital and on duty for a lot of it. Jase’s parents came to stay; sadly, Auntie Madge was unwell so could not come. There had been quite a lot of ‘flu going around prior to Christmas and she had also caught it. However, Peter and Suzanne were happy just to have some quiet family time with us and the girls (of course) loved having them in the house.

The girls had another round of present opening and enjoyed the fact that Christmas had come all over again! Here’s Lauren opening presents from Grandma and Granddad.

She also loved this little backpack with accessories for looking after “Babies” (her doll). Both Lauren and Jocey have had great fun with this little set.

After opening all her presents, she wanted to try on the scarf that I had received.

Here’s Jocey investigating all the toy food for their little grocery store. They’ve had hours of fun playing with all this toy food – stocking pretend shops with it, buying it from each other and taking it on pretend picnics!

Jase, Suzanne and the girls went down to the big new shopping centre, the Westfield to check it out. The girls looked lovely that day and they got lots of admiring looks.

January

All too soon, we were back at work.

The girls’ nursery, originally part of the Happy Times company, was taken over by another company last May. We were initially quite apprehensive along with a significant number of other parents. Our main concerns were obviously regarding the fate of carers already at the nursery and the standards of care offered. There were a number of teething issues and a lot of us were initially pretty displeased and disgruntled, but as the months went by, it became obvious that the management team were listening to the parents and trying to change things.

In January, we had the relaunch of the nursery under the new parent company, Casterbridge. They celebrated the occasion with an Open Day for the parents with food, smoothies, face painting and a Rainforest Roadshow.

Jocey had a close encounter with a boa constrictor and was fascinated by the texture of the skin. Poor Lauren was scared and could not be persuaded to touch any of the “scary” creatures, such as snakes, spiders and lizards!

Here’s Jase with the girls.

Here are the girls with one of the cute, fluffy guinea pigs. Lauren just about managed to touch it!

The day was a definite success and we were pleased to be informed of all the positive changes that had taken place at the nursery.

Chinese New Year came along at the end of January this year. We welcomed in the Year of the Ox, my horoscope sign, with the usual massive rounds of family feasting. Our fridge was groaning under the weight of all the food.

I was really proud of our New Year’s feast. Quite an achievement for a weekday endeavour, I thought.

Sadly, because it was a weekday, the girls were at nursery during the day and Jocey was too tired to share the meal with us. She hadn’t been particularly well and went to bed early. Lauren really enjoyed it though!

Here she is having fun with Daddy before we tucked into the main event.

February

The beginning of February brought our friends Jill, Mark and their children from chilly Glasgow down to London to visit us. The trip had been discussed for a long time; it was great to finally have them down with us.

We took them out to the Royal China for Dim Sum on one of the busiest weekends of Chinese New Year. The Chinese community was out in force, as well as a large number of tourists who’d come to watch the lion dances. It was a bitterly cold day but we all wrapped up warm.

The restaurant was extremely busy and it took us at least 40 minutes to get a seat. Luckily, poor Jill (who is pregnant with Baby Three) got to sit down.

Here’s Mark with Emily, who unbelievably is almost five years old now!

And here’s Jill with Christopher, who was still just a baby when we last saw him.

The children played together really well, apart from the odd tantrum over sharing issues and the weekend went very well indeed. We adults also had some time in the evening to chat when all the children were off to bed.

Unfortunately, on Sunday night the heavens opened and a ton of snow fell onto London whilst we were all asleep. I knew that they would be in trouble because I had been up in the night to get milk for Jocey from the kitchen and had seen the already massive snowfall in our back garden.

When Monday morning came, I braved the 6 inches of snow to go to work but Jase was snowed in (worst snowfall had been around Epsom where he works and the roads around there were all closed) and Jill and Mark’s flight back to Scotland was cancelled. We were really pleased that they had to stay a bit longer and I suspect that they were too. The children made the best of it and had a wonderful day frolicking in the snow and building a snowman in the back garden.

Here’s Lauren with a snowball aimed at Daddy!

They eventually made it back to Scotland on the Wednesday; it was great that we had had that extra time together.

March

The end of February and the beginning of March saw us going on our trip to Hong Kong to see my grandparents and our extended family. We were really excited because it was finally a chance for the girls to see the rest of their family. We were a bit nervous about a long flight but hoped that they would take it in their stride, having already flown to Chicago with them.

I must admit that they did very well despite the long journey; they did manage to sleep for a lot of it and although I was very cramped holding Jocey on my lap almost the entire time, I was glad that they hadn’t really been fussy.

My grandparents met us at the airport and were thrilled to meet all their great grandchildren for the first time. Four generations of the family were finally together. I could tell that they really loved getting to know the children. We had many happy family meals together.

Here is one of me, the girls, Gung Gung and the great-grandparents.

Here’s one of Lauren and Jocey with Auntie Winnie, who took them to feed the goldfish at one restaurant.

I was surprised at how shy the girls were; I think they were initially a bit overwhelmed at meeting so many new people. However, by the end of the trip they had come out of their shells and were happy to play with my extended family.

During the trip, we visited Disneyland Hong Kong and had a brilliant day out. Lauren and Jocey loved it and were so excited when they met Mickey Mouse in the flesh. It was a small site, just the right size for toddlers.

Lauren absolutely loved the marching band and the parades.

Our ability to go on rides was quite limited as Lauren was so timid. When we went on the Winnie the Pooh ride, she was terrified by the Woozles. To be fair, I thought it was too scary for toddlers too.

Jocey, as always, took everything in her stride and was fearless. She even enjoyed the 3D musical experience, despite the loud crashes and bangs from the orchestra.

Here are the girls with Gung Gung and Po Po.

Here is Lauren smiling before the fireworks started. However, once they did start she didn’t like the noise at all, poor girl.

As well as this, we managed to cram in trips on the Star Ferry over to Kowloon side, as unusually we were staying on Hong Kong island on this occasion, near Fortress Hill.

The girls with Daddy at the Star Ferry terminus in Kowloon.

Whilst in Kowloon, I took the girls to play in Kowloon park, which I haven’t visited since I was a little girl. It was a favourite haunt when I was small.

On the Sunday before we came home, we visited a great street market in the streets near our hotel. It was buzzing with noise and colour, and full of locals doing their shopping.

I was really sorry to come home to London because I had really enjoyed it and the girls were just getting used to life there. I found Hong Kong much more satisfying and less alien than on my previous trip. I think that this was because I had not been back for such a long time prior to 2005 (15 years since the previous visit) that it had come as a bit of a shock to see how changed it was. That time it was if the Hong Kong from my childhood had been taken away and replaced by something I didn’t recognise at all.

This time was definitely better. However, I was really sad that we didn’t get to see my Aunt Winnie (my dad’s sister, not the one in the previous photo who is my Uncle Eric’s wife) who is having chemotherapy at the moment. We were all anxious and worried about her but also didn’t want her falling ill from catching any of our germs whilst having her treatment.

Whilst out there, I applied for a Hong Kong identity card as I have right of abode in Hong Kong as I was born there. As well as allowing my speedy entry without a visa into Hong Kong, it will also give the girls the opportunity to apply for their own ID cards in the future should they want to spend more time there too. I’m keen for the girls to have as many options open to them as possible and for them to recognise their rich Chinese heritage. It would be all too easy for them to grow up completely Westernised, and I do not want that to happen to them.

When we were out there, I also took a little detour to Sydney, where I’d been invited to attend an interview with a hospital who have head-hunted me through an agent and are interested in giving me a permanent position as a consultant. Although there are a number of hoops to jump through before I can take up the job, we decided after long discussions in Hong Kong that we are going to try to emigrate at the end of the year. We did try to go previously but found that all the doors were closed and that all roads became dead ends.

Suddenly, I find that the way is opening up again and our dream of escaping London is fast becoming a reality. All the parts of the jigsaw are falling neatly into place and it all seems somehow fated.

Who are we to argue? I’m still not sure how we will pull it off but I’m confident that with a little faith we can achieve our goal.

So much to do

2009-03-15T02:53:00.004+11:00

We've been back from our holiday a week and a bit now and I know that there is still so much to talk about. I've realised that I haven't even got round to putting the pictures up from New Year yet!

Whilst on holiday, we made some firm decisions about the near future. Firstly, we are going to try to sell the house. I've got a decorator to come round next week to start work on getting the house smartened up for sale. Everything needs to look spick and span before we invite the estate agents round as I want to get the best price possible for our house. I realise that in this financial climate we will need to be realistic about what that is (unfortunately, probably about £100,000 less than the price I could have put it on the market 18 months ago).

Once we've sold the house, we are going to rent in Richmond closer to the nursery for a while until we are ready to make our ultimate move. More about that soon!

A weekend of packing up and de-cluttering looms ahead; no doubt it will be the first of many.

Holidays!

2009-02-21T02:49:00.001+11:00

We are off on our holidays tonight! The whole family are flying to Hong Kong to visit my grandparents and extended family. Lauren and Jocey haven't met my grandparents before, so we are all very excited. My grandparents have told my parents that they can't wait and are coming to meet us when we land on Saturday afternoon.

It's also the longest plane journey that the girls have been on so we are a bit nervous. Last time coming back from Chicago, Jocey refused to sleep for the entire flight, which was tough. We were all shattered by the time we got off the plane, as that meant that none of us adults had any sleep either.

I have just about finished packing now but as always, I have that nagging doubt in the back of my mind about whether or not I've forgotten to pack something. I suppose I'll find out soon enough!

So glad that the holiday has finally arrived. Yippee!

Rapid catch up…

2009-02-16T21:58:00.006+11:00

I’ve finally got up to date with our photos online – our photos from the last three months are all uploaded and can be seen by clicking the link to my Flickr albums.

Now, highlights from the last three months’ family activities!

New Year

The girls had another round of present opening and enjoyed the fact that Christmas had come all over again! Here’s Lauren opening presents from Grandma and Granddad.

She also loved this little backpack with accessories for looking after “Babies” (her doll). Both Lauren and Jocey have had great fun with this little set.

After opening all her presents, she wanted to try on the scarf that I had received.

Jase, Suzanne and the girls went down to the big new shopping centre, the Westfield to check it out. The girls looked lovely that day and they got lots of admiring looks.

January

All too soon, we were back at work.

Here’s Jase with the girls.

Here are the girls with one of the cute, fluffy guinea pigs. Lauren just about managed to touch it!

The day was a definite success and we were pleased to be informed of all the positive changes that had taken place at the nursery.

I was really proud of our New Year’s feast. Quite an achievement for a weekday endeavour, I thought.

Here she is having fun with Daddy before we tucked into the main event.

February

The restaurant was extremely busy and it took us at least 40 minutes to get a seat. Luckily, poor Jill (who is pregnant with Baby Three) got to sit down.

Here’s Mark with Emily, who unbelievably is almost five years old now!

And here’s Jill with Christopher, who was still just a baby when we last saw him.

Here’s Lauren with a snowball aimed at Daddy!

They eventually made it back to Scotland on the Wednesday; it was great that we had had that extra time together.

March

Here is one of me, the girls, Gung Gung and the great-grandparents.

Here’s one of Lauren and Jocey with Auntie Winnie, who took them to feed the goldfish at one restaurant.

Lauren absolutely loved the marching band and the parades.

Jocey, as always, took everything in her stride and was fearless. She even enjoyed the 3D musical experience, despite the loud crashes and bangs from the orchestra.

Here are the girls with Gung Gung and Po Po.

Here is Lauren smiling before the fireworks started. However, once they did start she didn’t like the noise at all, poor girl.

As well as this, we managed to cram in trips on the Star Ferry over to Kowloon side, as unusually we were staying on Hong Kong island on this occasion, near Fortress Hill.

The girls with Daddy at the Star Ferry terminus in Kowloon.

Whilst in Kowloon, I took the girls to play in Kowloon park, which I haven’t visited since I was a little girl. It was a favourite haunt when I was small.

On the Sunday before we came home, we visited a great street market in the streets near our hotel. It was buzzing with noise and colour, and full of locals doing their shopping.

Who are we to argue? I’m still not sure how we will pull it off but I’m confident that with a little faith we can achieve our goal.

Snow Fun!

2009-02-03T01:25:00.002+11:00

Click here for more.

Family portraits

2009-01-22T09:55:00.002+11:00

I don't have much time left this evening because I didn't get home from work until late, so I will talk about the festive period more tomorrow.
However, we had some professional photos taken of Lauren and Jocey and were thrilled with the result. The grandparents got the photos framed as their Christmas present and loved them.

The thing I really love about the photos is that their personalities really come through and the girls looks relaxed and natural. You can also see how much they adore each other.
I had never really thought that we needed professional photos of the family before but now I can see that they bring something slightly different to the table. This has been a really positive experience and I would be less hesitant to get more taken in the future.

Festive fun, part 1

2009-01-22T09:39:00.002+11:00

I can't believe it's been three weeks since we all headed back to work properly after Christmas. Both Jase and I have had a mad time at work and haven't really had time to do anything extra at all. On top of that, poor Jocey has been really unwell and had the winter vomiting bug for about 6 days, resulting in both of us having to take time off work.

I guess the impression that the festive season was a long time ago was compounded by the fact that I had to work in the week running up to the New Year, so only had a week's break.

We did manage to cram quite a lot into the festive period and had both sets of parents down to spend time with us in London. Mum and dad were the first to arrive and spent Christmas with us.

The girls were thrilled to see their Gung Gung and Po Po and really enjoyed all the extra hugs, kisses and attention.

I think this was the first Christmas that Lauren actually understood in terms of the actual celebration of Christmas and may be the first one she will properly remember. Jocey enjoyed herself but still didn't really understand what the fuss was about!

Christmas saw the house full of family; we had my cousins Amy and Antony over on Christmas Eve. On Christmas Day we had Jason, Charlotte and George, Charlotte's dad and his partner Jen over so it was a really merry affair.

The girls and the grandparents also really enjoyed playing with George. It was fantastic to see the children all so happy together. I cooked roast goose with all the trimmings and was very pleased with the outcome. There were many happy faces at the dinner table; I was glad that it was all well received.

Charlotte provided a lovely Christmas pud for dessert, which everyone greatly enjoyed some time later, when we felt ready to eat a little bit more. On Boxing Day, we had a more laid back affair and had a wonderful beef rib roast. The children did more playing and everyone had a lovely time.

Lauren had a great time pretending to be Dora the Explorer and made Jocey Boots the monkey. Quite apt for a little girl who discovered a great new game - swinging from our standard lamps.

When Jocey wouldn't co-operate and wanted to do her own thing, I had the honour of being the monkey!

However, the girls did play a lot together and clearly had a lot of fun in the process.

We were sad to see them go on the Monday after the Christmas weekend but didn't have to wait long before Jase's parents came to spend some time with us. When they arrived on the Tuesday, the girls were thrilled and somehow knew that the festive fun was bound to continue for a bit longer.

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-27T02:23:00.001+11:00

The Ayers household is having a quiet day after a day of merry making yesterday on Christmas Day. We hope that all our family and friends also had a wonderful day.

My Camera (by Lauren)

2008-12-27T00:27:00.001+11:00

Here is Christmas Day 2008 as recorded by me (Lauren) on my new Camera...

Click the photo to see more.

Road to recovery

2008-12-15T10:12:00.000+11:00

The household has gradually been getting back to normal following our week of illness. Even Jocey, who seems the slowest of us to recover, seems to be getting there now and hasn't run a fever today. She still isn't eating like she normally would, but I am hoping that she too is on the road to recovery.

Lauren has had a good weekend as her tummy medicines kicked in. Last week, she was vomiting whilst she was unwell, and had difficulty getting her appetite back. She has become really skinny due to being repeatedly ill since the summer so we have been really worried about her. Even Jocey, who is normally a good eater seems to have slowed down in terms of growth as she has been unwell so often this winter.

On Saturday, I took Lauren to a birthday party in Kingston. It was the party of one of her friends from her old room at nursery, the infamous James. Whilst she was in the 2-3 year old room, there was a time when she would often come home and say that "James did it" for various ailments, bumps and bruises! I was never sure if there was always truth in the matter (one time Lauren complained of a sore neck and said that James had done it. When I examined her neck I found a really large gland there which must have come up whilst she had had a sore throat; I am sure that that was the cause of her discomfort, not James!). Thus I was a little surprised that Lauren was invited to the party.

However, they must have got over their previous differences as they seemed quite happy to play at the party. James's parents were lovely and really welcoming. The party was a lot of fun and Amanda's Action Kids were on hand to provide the entertainment.

When the cake came, it was spectacular. It was an African theme with animals of the savanna on top. There was a zebra, a giraffe, an elephant, a lion and I think a monkey. James's dad told us that it had been really difficult keeping the cake a secret from James because the giraffe's neck was so long that a hole had had to be cut in the box to accommodate the head. With the head sticking out, they had had an interesting time trying to stop James from destroying it before the party.

As soon as the candles were out, James proceeded to take the animals off the cake and eat them!

Lauren had great fun and for the first time seemed to enjoy taking part in Amanda more, even though she (and a few others) were terribly shy to begin with.

Here she is enjoying a bit of cake.

Last weekend, before we all became ill, we enjoyed a lovely afternoon at Snakes and Ladders, where we'd had fun before. Last week, we also had a flying visit from Suzanne; Lauren and Jocey were really pleased to see their grandma. I'm hoping she didn't catch our germs!

Both Lauren and Jocey had a great time on the climbing frames, slides and swings.

Here are two pictures of the girls hugging / wrestling...

It's lovely that they are so affectionate with each other!

You can see all of the photos from this month on our Flickr site.

Today, I've spent most of the day cooking and getting ready for going back to work next week. At 10pm, I finally finished all the chores, baking, lunches and dinners for next week. No wonder I got so run down and got floored by the flu last week. Even my weekends aren't much of a break!

I've decided that I must be more careful with things and take more rest so as not to get so run down again. It's horrible being unwell and no good for the family either.

House of Lurgy

2008-12-10T22:30:00.001+11:00

On Sunday, we were all struck down by the dreaded lurgy. All of us have had sore throats, coughs and sneezes. The poor girls have been running fevers too and have found it difficult to sleep at night. As a consequence, we've not had much sleep either.

I've had the whole week off so far due to this. I still feel awful and don't want to infect all my colleagues, who are working flat out as it is and I am sure would not appreciate being ill this close to the festive season. Lauren is better and went back to nursery today but Jocey is still running a temperature.

I can't believe what a rotten winter we've had; we seem to have been constantly ill this year. I do find winter in the UK pretty miserable at the best of times - this year has been particularly unpleasant. I hope we're not ill over Christmas; that really would be the last straw!

Ooooooh!

2008-12-06T02:09:00.001+11:00

I've had a brilliant morning at the new Westfield shopping centre. I've had time back over the last two days for working last weekend, but yesterday was unfortunately taken up with work related stuff, so I basically ended up working from home.

Today, I dropped off the girls at nursery and had a much needed morning to myself. I decided to head off to the new Westfield shopping centre; I felt it was time I did so after I had to bail out last time.

Well, I can say that I certainly wasn't disappointed. Everything inside was light, airy and beautiful like shopping in a winter wonderland. The staff were helpful and courteous and it wasn't too crowded initially. Of course, after lunchtime it began to fill up with people getting home from work early.

Inside it was tidy, clean, comfortable and well laid out. Everything (including lifts) seemed to be working. There was a mind boggling selection of shops and places to eat. I felt really spoiled for choice.

In the end though, I was very controlled and didn't go mad. I bought a Christmas present for George and have some really good ideas for everyone else. Now I'm going to see if I can get some of the things I've seen today online for less.

When we lived in Sydney, it was always our tradition on a Saturday morning to go down to our local Westfield shopping centre (in Chatswood) to have sushi and to go shopping. I honoured that tradition today and had sushi for lunch; it put a smile on my face to be able to do so again.

I can't wait to go back to the Westfield again for more shopping heaven!

Work frenzy

2008-12-05T00:19:00.001+11:00

Following my post about playing with dolls, I have had a chance to demonstrate our hospital's new simulator to our staff. It all went extremely well and they were all excited and enthusiastic about getting to train on it themselves.

Some rather unexpected things have come out of that day. Firstly, I am beginning to realise that I am leading on an absolutely enormous project which is getting bigger and bigger by the minute. I have been approached by people outside the hospital interested in our simulator. Some want to be able to train on it and others just want to learn more about what we're doing.

I have even been approached to do a research project with a really high powered team in medical education. I was completely flabbergasted.

This afternoon, I am going to be interviewed by one of the local radio stations about the simulator. Since I've never done an interview before, I am (and this is putting it mildly) pretty scared.

Looks like I'm going to be busy at work for the next little while!

Over the hill

2008-12-05T00:08:00.000+11:00

Yesterday, I opened a letter for Jase which looked like junk mail. I had to laugh when I realised what it was.

Poor Jase! I especially liked the line "for people aged 50 and over"; I am pretty sure I put fewer candles on his last birthday cake than that.

Debriefing the debrief

2008-12-02T05:23:00.001+11:00

I have spent the last three days (yes, all weekend...poor Jase entertained the girls all that time on his own without complaint) up to my eyeballs in educational theory and learning how to encourage people to learn through simulation.

Essentially, this involved playing with adult sized, highly sophisticated medical "dolls" which were programmed to suffer from all sorts of nasty conditions. I worked with a fantastic bunch of people all weekend to come to the rescue of these dolls to save them time and time again from certain death.

After each session, we learned to debrief each other to bring out learning points for the whole group. We then had our debrief debriefed in turn. It has been hard work, at times stressful but in the end a lot of fun.

Playing with dolls is serious stuff. I'm sure Lauren agrees with me.

Poor health

2008-11-25T23:46:00.000+11:00

We've all been ill again this weekend. I had to pick up Lauren early from nursery because she had a bad cold and was running a high fever. She was ill the entire weekend and gave the bug to Jocey, who has been grumpier than usual with it. They seem to be constantly unwell at the moment with one bug after another. Jase also managed to give me his tummy bug from earlier on in the week so I had a miserable weekend too.

I think this year we've been ill much more often than in previous years and I am sure that this is because we are all really tired. I am still getting up several times in the night (especially now that the girls aren't feeling well) and generally don't get enough sleep. Coupled with getting up early for work and long days, we are just about surviving and no more.

I hope we can look forward to something better than this in the future because this current situation is not a life at all.

Snakes and Ladders

2008-11-22T09:48:00.002+11:00

On Tuesday, we had more rain so all thoughts of going to the park were quickly abandoned. We had been to Bramley's in the past on a rainy day but I just didn't want to go on public transport on that day. After a little bit of research, I decided to take the girls to another soft play indoor playground in Brentford, actually on the grounds of Syon Park where Jason and Charlotte had their wedding.

I was pleasantly surprised. It was easy to park and although a bit of a walk from the car park, Snakes and Ladders was a lot of fun. It was much bigger than I expected, with a three storey climbing frame for the bigger kids.

It cost £9.50 for all of us to get in and we had an hour of Amanda's Action Kids for free whilst we were there. It was definitely much better value for money than my last time with Amanda (although of course the Riverside is a wonderful location). Lauren became really shy during the Amanda session and refused to participate, even though Jocey was enjoying it. I really don't know why she was so self conscious. Half way through, she lost interest and wanted to play on the climbing frame.

Both Lauren and Jocey had a fabulous time, especially on the slides and bouncy castles. I was really quite surprised at how much Jocey has come on in terms of what she can do physically. She got a lot more out of it than I expected.

Best of all it was fantastic to watch them playing together. Lauren had a great time sliding into this ball pit and tumbling into the balls.

Jocey loved watching her do this; she just laughed and laughed.

We had a good lunch there too. As usual, Jocey demolished her food and then proceeded to "investigate" Lauren's food. I couldn't help laughing when Jocey slyly helped herself to some of Lauren's chips.

To be fair, when Lauren found out what was happening she did graciously share her food with Jocey. It makes me so happy that they play and share.

It was mid afternoon before they agreed to go home. After all the exertion, they both fell asleep on the journey back but they clearly had a great time. We'll definitely go again. Even though Bramley's is closer, I do find going by car easier than going on public transport with the two children. I know that's not very eco-friendly, but we can all only do the best we can.

There are more photos from our day out on my Flickr album here.

Ouch!

2008-11-22T09:17:00.001+11:00

Poor Daddy stubbed his toe on the skirting board whilst playing with Jocey last weekend. The toe then proceeded to swell and turn black and blue.

It was obviously broken so I gave Jase a bit of sympathy, strapped it up and instructed him to take painkillers. He hobbled around for a few days but now it's definitely improved.

I also sustained my own ouch, courtesy of Lauren. We had a conversation on Tuesday along these lines:

Lauren: "Mummy, I'm three!"

Mummy: "Yes that's right, Lauren. How old is Jocey?"

Lauren: "One."

Mummy: "Yes, clever girl! How old is Mummy?"

Lauren: "Don't know."

Mummy: "Aah, Mummy is thirty-five."

Lauren (after long pause): "Forty-five?"

Mummy: "No, thirty-five!"

Lauren (quite firmly): "Forty-five."

Ouch.

Weekend washout

2008-11-11T09:21:00.001+11:00

We've all been unwell this weekend with upset stomachs. Lauren and Jocey have both been vomiting, leading to multiple changes of bedding and piles of extra washing. My poor babies!

Lauren is fortunately better but still a bit grumpy and tired. She had a good day at nursery today though, and was full of laughter and conversation on the way home.

Jocey is still running a slight fever and has a runny nose and cough. This evening, I also discovered that all four of her premolars are emerging at once. It must be so painful; I gave her some painkillers and an extra hug this bedtime. My poor darling girl.

Mummy and Daddy haven't fared much better, so none of us have had much fun this weekend. None of us have had much of an appetite. It was a shame because we all ended up staying at home, with the girls catching up on their sleep.

I actually needed a rest this weekend; I've been travelling into central London all week to go to courses. Whilst it was fun to go on the courses, I don't envy the people who have to do all that commuting every day. Being squashed into a tiny space on a Tube train during rush hour when you're tired and grumpy is no fun at all.

I had originally planned to go to the newly opened Westfield shopping centre, a huge new shopping centre in Shepherds Bush that I blogged about some time ago in anticipation.

It looks lovely on the news and I can't wait to see it in the flesh. However, I plan to go without the girls on the first occasion as I suspect it will be mobbed. Also, Charlotte told Jase that it was still quite child unfriendly as the lifts were still being sorted out.

Anyway, off to get some sleep myself now before facing another busy day tomorrow.

SuperMummy Event photos

2008-11-04T00:03:00.001+11:00

Mini-et-Moi who hosted the Cupcake Event that Emma and I attended in Wandsworth have posted some pictures and a blog entry on their website from the day.

There are some pics of the girls and me (looking rather serious in two of the shots!) enjoying our time there. It seems that they are planning another event slightly closer to us in West London for the future. I will be looking forward to that with interest.

Cold!

2008-10-31T22:42:00.001+11:00

We did get snow. Jase went to work on Wednesday and sent me this picture.

A few people struggled into work with mountains of snow on their cars too. Apparently this is the first snow in London in October for 74 years. There's no snow today but it is very cold.

Winter is with us!

Cupcake fun!

2008-10-29T10:32:00.001+11:00

There are days when I am utterly amazed that I make it out of bed at all.

For what seems like months on end now, I have had very little sleep because both girls have been quite troublesome at night. Lauren is currently refusing to sleep in her own bed in her bedroom, so is camping out on her mattress in our room. Jocey has had the cold for weeks and has been waking up several times in the night every night. Inevitably, she wakes up Lauren at some point in the night too.

Between the two of them, I have been struggling along on a few hours of sleep every night (and of course going to work and dealing with the daily whirlwind-that-is-work too). It's been so bad that I have had a series of migraines lately after having been migraine free for ages.

I've been aware that I have been feeling really rather down as a result of this chronic lack of sleep, so felt that I should make every effort this afternoon to attend a "SuperMummy event" hosted by Mini-et-Moi at a Mummy spa in Wandsworth called Cupcake.

I had been invited as a Blogging Mummy by the organisers - I was really chuffed by this. I convinced another hard working mummy from work, Emma, to come too. I wasn't quite brave enough to face all those "yummy mummies" by myself!

I turned up just on time to find Emma waiting in her car for me. She had left her two with her in-laws as the children were being taken to see a show. I had managed to bundle Lauren and Jocey into the car after a morning at the park and trying to get them to eat their lunches with as much sense of urgency as I could. Of course, I had failed miserably and Lauren had taken her lunch at her usual snail's pace. Jocey was tired and grumpy at not being able to sleep after the park so was not her usual cheerful self either.

After successfully laddering my tights whilst trying to change into something vaguely presentable and failing to get the sat nav to work on the first attempt, I was slightly flustered on arrival.

However, all this was forgotten when we got into the spa. It was lovely, and the concept is a really good one - it has a crèche and organises fun things for the children to do to allow hassled and busy mums some time for a much needed pampering. Emma and I laughed about the possibility of leg waxing at some point in the distant future when our lives were less mad.

Although we stuck to the non-alcoholic drinks and didn't take any of the champagne that was on offer, we still had a good time. Lauren and Jocey wouldn't play in the crèche because they were tired and grumpy, so stayed with me and ate rice cake snacks, which they both really enjoyed. Emma and I watched the demonstrations with interest, though we were both deeply suspicious of the personal shopper service when seriously heavy weight designer items were brought to the fore. No price tags always equals trouble in my experience!

At the end of the afternoon, we had the chance to briefly have a look around and eat the remaining pink cupcake on offer. It was very good, and a taste of the good life in general.

Although Cupcake is too far away for us to use its facilities, we had a fun afternoon and I think that the idea is a good one. You do feel frazzled and worn down by every day life as a mum and opportunities to look after yourself are rare. I was amazed by the number of the glamorous looking mums there with their equally glamorous offspring in tow. However (as I said to Emma at the time), I figured out some time ago that I was never going to be "perfect" so had stopped beating myself up about it.

In spite of all the odds, I got out of bed and did something fun today with my girls. That has got to be an achievement in itself.

Birthday weekend

2008-10-29T09:49:00.000+11:00

Daddy turned 36 two weekends ago and Jase's parents and Aunty Madge came to visit. They were all in good spirits and had some exciting news for us. Suzanne was recently contacted by her birth family and found out (much to her surprise) that she had a brother and sisters that she had never known about. She brought some old family photos and her newly discovered family tree for us all to see. It was all very exciting and I hope that her meeting with them goes well (this coming weekend I think).

Lauren and Jocey were really pleased to see them and went to the park with them on the Saturday whilst I was constructing Daddy's chocolate birthday cake (with chocolate sprinkles, of course). Unfortunately, I seem to have forgotten to take any photos of the finished article; however, I was very proud of it and it did taste good.

Despite the cold and the wind, they all had a fun time. Lauren even tried out the roundabout and the newly mended climbing frame. She loves sliding down the slide backwards!

Jocey also had fun, but did seem a bit tired because of her cold.

On the Sunday, Lauren and I were invited to her friend Lorenzo's birthday party at a place called Eddie Catz in Putney. We arrived quite early because I had been afraid that the traffic in Fulham would be terrible and so had left early. I worked at Charing Cross Hospital on the Fulham Palace Road in 2005 and had spent many a time stuck in a traffic jam around the hospital so was wary of the area.

Lauren was a little shy initially but quickly got over this as she saw more and more people she knew. She spent the whole time playing with her friend Cameron and they both had a wonderful time going up and down the climbing frames and slides and playing with all the toys at Eddie Catz.

Lorenzo and his parents clearly enjoyed the party too. When the children sat down for their meal, I had a brief opportunity to chat to his mummy Natalia; we talked a lot about the nursery and how our children are currently finding their move to the big room.

Soon it was time for the children to tuck into Lorenzo's gorgeous chocolate cake and for the grown ups to try out the other yummy cakes brought by Lorenzo's mummy and daddy.

I don't think any of the children wanted to leave at the end of the party, but I had to take Lauren home because I could tell that she was really tired. We both had a really fantastic time.

That evening, the family went out to eat at a local gastropub, the Princess Victoria. Despite having won an award from London's Time Out magazine, we admitted at the end of the meal that we had been a tad disappointed. The food had the potential to be stunning and we found the starters and the dessert to be fab, but the main courses were not quite right. Both Jase and I had ordered the beef with Yorkshire puddings to find that although the beef was good, the Yorkshires were rock hard. I am hoping that the next time we go, the food will be better.

A busy weekend, but lots of fun was had.

Autumn Glory

2008-10-29T09:12:00.000+11:00

I heard on the radio on the way home tonight that the temperature will fall to -3 degrees C. It might even snow. I supposed I shouldn't be surprised as it is the end of October now, the clocks have gone back and the nights are drawing in. Winter is well on the way.

However, over the last few weeks we have enjoyed the last of the autumn sunshine. We've had a few glorious weekends with sunshine where we ventured out to the park for fun and frolics. There was no mistaking it for summer, though; despite the sun there was a definite chill in the air.

The trees have been a riot of colour; when we went down to Ravenscourt Park a few weekends ago I took some great photos.

It was breathtaking. I can understand why Jase loves autumn so much.

Lauren and Jocey have both had fun with all these trips to the parks. Ironically, Lauren isn't interested in anything but the swings after overcoming her fear of them.

She's tried out several ones over the last few weekends.

She seemed to especially enjoy this tyre swing at Ravenscourt Park and went on it twice whilst we were at the park.

This includes revisiting the very first swing she ever went on. Below is one of the pictures I took at the time of Lauren on that same swing two and a half years ago.

This time she didn't need my handbag behind her to prop her up!

I can't believe how quickly she has grown up. I've blinked and suddenly she's gone from a baby into a swing-obsessed three year old.

After the obligatory visit to the swings, we laid out our picnic rug under the trees to enjoy the sunshine. Despite the credit crunch, our rapidly shrinking savings and the daily collapse of banks all over the world, we decided to push the boat out and get some ice creams.

I think most people are being similarly cautious with their money at the moment. However, life is not worth living if you can't have the occasional treat every now and then.

I suspect it will be a while before we are enjoying the sunshine like this again. Today, we went to the park but it was so cold despite the sunshine that the girls were keen to come home after only half an hour. My girls dislike the cold and I can't say I blame them - I'm afraid I'm not a fan either. I'd much rather a warm climate!

The Imagination of the 3 Year Old

2008-10-17T05:09:00.001+11:00

I found this on the wall at Lauren's nursery. It reads "I am drawing Daddy, Jocelyn, Mummy, George and Grandma. George is my cousin, he is 5. I like playing with my cousin. My grandma lives with me."...!

Click the picture to open it in a new window then click on the "All Sizes" link to make it bigger.

Fun with Amanda

2008-10-08T08:28:00.000+11:00

It rained almost all day today. It was so miserable that none of us really wanted to get up, never mind leave the house. Lauren had crawled into bed with me during the night, as she has done for about two weeks now. I'm not sure why she's doing this but clearly on some level she feels that she needs extra reassurance at the moment.

The three of us were able to have a bit of a lie-in as it was my day off from work and Jase managed to leave for work in the morning without slamming the door. However, we were all eventually woken up by Jocey who just did not want to stay asleep anymore. Lauren and I were not impressed.

After breakfast, the girls played for a bit before Jocey got grumpy and fractious; it became obvious that she wanted to go back to bed. After a bottle of milk, we didn't hear another peep from her for another three hours.

I felt a bit guilty that Lauren had missed out on the opportunity to go out in the morning and early afternoon because of the weather and Jocey going off to sleep. However, Jocey was clearly very tired so I didn't want to wake her. I did an Internet search for some ideas of activities we could do when Jocey finally got up.

Previously at Happy Times in Hammersmith, she had enjoyed Amanda's Action Kids, which were fun Music and Movement type classes. I'm not sure if she has these now at the Richmond nursery so I decided to look on their website as I vaguely remembered that they ran some classes in Chiswick. I was pleased to find that there was a Tuesday afternoon class available at the Riverside Health and Racquets Club and that I didn't need to be a member, just to pay at the door.

It's always interesting to look around health clubs. I must admit that I was really impressed by the Riverside; it had a clean, contemporary look and seemed to have really great facilities. Judging by the number of parents with young children there, it also appeared really family oriented, like our own Park Club.

We had a superb time. Although Lauren and Jocey were a bit fazed at first, they soon got over their shyness and uncertainty and joined in. It wasn't long before they were shaking rattles, singing and dancing with the other children there.

I will definitely remember that option for a future rainy day.

New for old

2008-10-06T09:18:00.001+11:00

This weekend I have been playing with technology. Jase installed Windows Vista on my machine and now everything looks so gorgeous!

I am having a play with it to get used to all the new ways of doing things. It's like having a brand new computer all over again!

On Saturday, I also updated the software running inside my smartphone. I bought a Blackberry Curve in June and now it is my pride and joy. I couldn't do without it, but have found the lack of video capabilities annoying. So imagine my surprise and delight when I found that upgrading the software has added video options to my phone! I had to try it out just to make sure it worked and am pleased to report that it did.

I will be looking forward to taking little snippets of video footage whenever I have a moment I want to keep for posterity!

Party, Park and Play

2008-10-06T08:39:00.000+11:00

Lately, our time has been disappearing at an alarming rate. I can't believe that a whole month has passed since we returned from Chicago and the big wedding; it honestly doesn't seem that long. To be fair, it is perhaps still fresh in my mind because I've been blogging about it over the last few weeks.

On our return from Chicago, I was catapulted into a busy week on call at work. However, at the weekend, Lauren had the opportunity to go to her first birthday party.

She was invited by one of her best friends at nursery, a little boy named Cameron. I was so relieved and pleased that after all the upheaval of changing nurseries, Lauren quickly started to make new friends. She now has a core of close friends - Cameron, Lorenzo, Suzie and Lilah amongst others at the nursery.

Although she remembers her old friends, I don't think she thinks about them much anymore. Her chatter on coming home from nursery is always about her new friends. We went to Ravenscourt Park last weekend and passed by her old nursery but she did not recognise it at all.

Cameron's party was held at a child friendly pizza place in Kew. Lauren and I were really excited as the time for the party drew nearer. We both got dressed up and arrived on time to find that we were the first ones there.

The room was lovely; it was upstairs with a beautiful view of the village of Kew and we had it all to ourselves. A big table was set for all the children and a smaller one for the adults.

I didn't really know what to expect as this was the first time I'd been to a children's party as a parent. I was surprised as the children were all quite shy; I think they were a bit thrown by seeing each other out of their familiar social context. After a while though, they did start playing together.

I was really touched when the time came for all the children to sit down to their lunch and the birthday boy Cameron wanted to sit next to Lauren!

The food was good and the children all enjoyed themselves. I found it hard to sit down with some of the other parents though as Lauren didn't really want me to leave her alone. She insisted that I sit down with her to eat my pizza, so I grazed the best I could.

All too soon, it was time for Cameron to open his presents and cut his cake. Here he is with his mum Kristen.

Cameron was really impressed with Lauren's fire engine gift, which she chose herself at the toy shop. It had all manner of lights and sirens which were instantly investigated by many of the little boys at the party after Cameron opened the present. I was glad he liked it, being one of Lauren's special friends.

Lauren ate all her cake, gave a Cameron a little hug and a kiss, we thanked Cameron's parents and then we went home. I was amazed that there were no tantrums or screaming from any of the children; they were all remarkably well behaved. I was proud of my Lauren!

In the past, I have written on a number of occasions about Lauren's previous aversion to the swings (started here, then continued here and here). Much to my surprise, in the last few months she has completely turned around. In the summer, she agreed to go on the swings with me if we only did very gentle swinging. As her confidence grew, she agreed to swinging higher and higher.

We've had a few recent trips to the park where all she wants to do is go on the swings. This has been a noticeable change since her birthday.

I'm glad of this change as Jocey really loves the swings and is keen to go on them every time we go to the park. Lauren also loves going on the same swing as Jocey; the girls spend all their time giggling together.

We've been really lucky to have a few really sunny weekends to enjoy. Here are the girls clambering around the play jeep at Wendell Park.

Lauren has hugs with Daddy.

Jocey has a turn of driving.

Lauren even ventured on the roundabout, another thing in the playground which she previously would have avoided.

We also met up with Charlotte and George in the last month, who has grown massively since we last saw him. He is coming up for 12 weeks now. He definitely will grow up to be tall; he now stands level with Jocey's shoulder blades!

Jocey herself is rapidly changing and growing in both confidence and ability. Although her language skills are behind Lauren's at the same age, Jocey is physically stronger and is now able to walk a couple of steps completely unaided. She is just short of 13 months and I think that that is a huge achievement. However, for speed she still prefers to crawl.

Her social skills are really quite advanced and I am sure that this is due to being a second child and playing with Lauren all the time. I remember that it took Lauren much longer to start to play with other children, whereas Jocey has already begun to occasionally play with Lauren.

However, some things are the same no matter which child you are bringing up. Here Jocey attempts to untidy my recycling box.

Almost identical to my experiences with Lauren when she was a year old! She then went on to untidy our folded laundry, much to my dismay.

And just like her sister, she is fascinated by shoes.

I have no idea why!

Lauren meanwhile has moved up into the Pre-school room at her nursery without any major problems. I was really proud of her. I know it will take her time to make new friends but she has settled in well so far. Her language skills are improving in leaps and bounds and her play is becoming much more sophisticated.

She is developing into quite an artist. This is a picture she drew recently, which I absolutely adore. Unfortunately, I could not keep the original as she had drawn it on a piece of mangled scrap paper but here it is digitally preserved for all time.

She tells me that it is a picture of Mummy, Daddy and Jocey. Mummy is on the left, Daddy is the big one in the middle and Jocey is the small one at the bottom between the wavy lines. I think she started to draw herself on the right hand side but then changed her mind. Isn't it fabulous?

She is also overcoming many of her previous fears (like the swings). Today, we went to swimming and she managed to swim completely by herself for most of the time we were in the pool with armbands for support. She's come such a long way from the girl who used to cry and wail whenever we went swimming!

Trip to Chicago: Part IV, Downtown adventure

2008-10-02T08:12:00.000+10:00

The week after the big wedding was really fabulous as we were all able to relax and enjoy downtown Chicago. I have to admit that I really loved the city; it was clean, stylish, fun and the people were really friendly everywhere.

Another unexpected bonus - the food was also really good. I have had many previous trips to the US before and encountered food that really wasn't so good; however, Chicago has a reputation for being a real foodie city and rightly so. Here we are on the final night in Chicago, after a really enjoyable Thai fusion meal.

We stayed in the Conrad in Chicago, right on the Magnificent Mile, the main shopping avenue downtown. It was probably the loveliest hotel I've stayed in for some years. We were shown to a pretty spacious room with two double beds and a large bathroom with a massive walk-in shower. The finish in the room was impeccable. Most impressive of all was the huge widescreen TV with the Bose surround sound system! Below is a picture of the room we stayed in.

Everything was well thought out and the staff were amazing. The concierge especially couldn't have done more to help and recommended some fantastic restaurants for our evening meals. Below was the excellent antipasto which we devoured at a restaurant they recommended called Quartino's.

We did quite a lot of sightseeing despite having to cater for and entertain the two little girls. In fact, they seemed to really enjoy going to see new places with us.

My cousin Margaret arranged for all of us to go on a boat trip to see the architectural sights of the city from the Chicago River. We felt that this was very fitting since my great uncle is a professor of architecture.

It really opened my eyes to the beautiful buildings in the city and we learned quite a lot about the city's history. I think of all the great buildings we saw, my absolute favourite was 333 West Wacker Drive.

Sitting on the bend of the Chicago River, this post modern building echoed the curve of the riverbank and its green glass windows almost rippled like the water in the river. Gorgeous!

After the boat trip, we took in the sights of Navy Pier. It was a very hot day, well into the 30s with quite high humidity and no wind. Lauren enjoyed looking at the bronze statues there.

However, we were all a bit disappointed to find that the Children's Museum was closed for the week following Labor Day. Later in the week, we took the bus to the famous Aquarium, only to find that it too was closed for the holiday week. What bad timing! I probably should have made sure it was open before setting out, but since we were already there we went to the nearby Field Museum instead, a large natural history museum.

Jocey enjoyed the exhibits and pointed at all the animals and birds on display. Lauren enjoyed everything apart from Sue, the large T Rex dinosaur in the atrium. It took a long time to convince her that it wouldn't bite and that it was actually fun to look at dinosaurs! I really laughed when she told me back at the hotel at the end of the day, "Mummy, I like dinosaurs!" All that brainwashing clearly helps - well, eventually.

We also had to go to the famous John Hancock Centre to see the city from the observation deck on the upper floors.

95 floors up is a restaurant where we had a rather average meal but were surrounded by an amazing view. Unfortunately, on the day we went it became quite foggy whilst we were up there, so the view disappeared after a while. This photo was taken just before the fog descended and is looking north from the John Hancock at the beaches of Lake Michigan and towards the Lincoln Park area.

Another highlight of the holiday was our visit to Millennium Park. This fabulous outdoor space is a green retreat for the city, despite having a massive car park in the ground beneath it.

Lauren and Jocey loved running around in the park and being given freedom to explore. Jocey, who is now very close to walking unaided, loved getting close to the birds we saw at the park. In the photo above, she was pointing and saying "Uuggh! Uuggh!" excitedly at some passing pigeons.

There are two outstanding sights to visit inside the park; one is the massive sculpture by British artist Anish Kapoor called "Cloud Gate" (nicknamed "The Bean" by locals).

The other is the equally impressive Jay Pritzker Pavilion, an auditorium for open air concerts. It looks almost like a giant seashell with these enormous steel poles arcing outwards from the mouth of the pavilion to form an open "roof" over the grassy space beyond the fixed seating.

We were lucky enough to be at the park when the soloists from Chicago's Lyric Opera were rehearsing for their big Millennium Park Concert with the great conductor Sir Andrew Davis. It was amazing, even though they were obviously holding their voices back for the big night. We sat in the audience until their rehearsal finished at lunchtime and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Even Lauren sat captivated by it all. I haven't been able to go to the theatre or the opera since the girls were born, so it was a real treat.

After the park, we took Lauren and Jocey to a toy shop within a big department store (now a Macy's but originally it was the famous flagship Marshall Field store in Chicago). Lauren fell in love with a bunny called Lollihop, which she brought home.

Jocey also fell in love. Initially this was with a big pony which was too big for Mummy to fit into her suitcase!

Later, she spotted Eebee and only had eyes for him after that. My parents bought Eebee for Jocey as her birthday present. Every day, she comes downstairs and on seeing him will go over and give him a big hug. She loves soft toys as much as her sister, and gives the Eeyore and Piglet which also came home with us (courtesy of Hubert and Bonnie) daily hugs too.

We also managed to pay a visit to the Lego store. Outside the store were some interesting Lego figures. Lauren was captivated by this little old lady with her doggie (must remind her of Bob).

Daddy, on the other hand, loved the man with the bird's nest on his head.

They also had a full size Darth Vader and R2D2 in the store, which Daddy particularly liked. Lauren refused to go in the store at first because of the green Lego dinosaur attacking some poor Lego construction workers!

Our final day in Chicago was Jocey's first birthday. We went out to a barbeque grill place for lunch and were surprised to see the waiter bring three little cakes with a candle on for her dessert.

Lauren was very excited to be helping Jocey blow out her candle on her first birthday!

Jocey had a great time and loved all the attention. Lauren couldn't understand why Jocey hadn't had a birthday before...

All in all, we had a fantastic time in the Windy City and hope we can go again soon. Funnily enough, apart from at the time this picture was taken, it wasn't really all that windy!

I was most disappointed when I found out that the "windy" part of the nickname refers to hot air and rhetoric rather than inclement weather!

All our photos from the week in the city can be found here (family photos) and here (architectural photos).

Trip to Chicago: Part III, The Big Wedding Day

2008-09-29T08:38:00.001+10:00

The day of the wedding arrived and the weather was beautiful, with glorious sunshine without being too oppressive. We went to Hube and Bonnie's house early to transport us, Hube, Dad and all our luggage to the new hotel. Mum stayed at the house to get her hair and makeup done with Bonnie and the bridesmaids. We had an incredible amount of luggage, which only just fit in the car with us. Thank goodness American cars are bigger than their British counterparts!

The new hotel was next door to the reception venue and where most of us were staying. It was lovely and after checking in we were immediately able to go to our rooms. As a surprise, we had booked a honeymoon suite for Hube and Bonnie as they hadn't arranged anything prior to that. Hube went to the room to find it had a big Jacuzzi!

One quick nap later, we rushed to get Lauren and Jocey ready for the wedding. It took me five attempts to get Lauren's hair in place (no hairspray, lots of wiggling and pulling out of clips) but at the end I was happy with it. She looked natural and beautiful.

We carted the girls off to church in their pyjamas to change them in the car park. We arrived in good time but a bit flustered, just before 2:30 in the afternoon for the 3 o'clock wedding.

The church was beautiful. Here is St Paul of the Cross from the outside on the day of the wedding.

Inside, it was spacious and cool with marble and stained glass windows.

Jase was immediately pulled off to organise the handing out of buttonholes and corsages, to organise the giving out of programs and general sorting out of the wedding party, as Bonnie's wedding organiser fell ill on the afternoon before the wedding. The rest of us sat patiently in the church to await the arrival of the bride.

A little after 3pm, the bridal party arrived and the ceremony began. The mothers of bride and groom led the way and came down the aisle together. They each lit a candle at the alter before the rest of the attendants appeared. Unfortunately, Lauren refused to walk at the last minute; I think it was a combination of tiredness and the fact that the flower basket was too heavy for her and therefore she didn't want to carry it. Daddy made a lovely replacement flower girl and walked down the aisle carrying her with Ruaraidh the ring bearer at his side.

Shortly after, Bonnie and her dad came down the aisle and we had our first glimpse of the wedding dress. It was in an ivory satin with intricate champagne coloured embroidery on the bodice and champagne coloured satin overskirt and trim. She looked radiant and beautiful. Here is her dad Joe giving her away.

There were a number of readings, of which I did one. I was pretty nervous, but remembered to take my time and speak up to be heard. I had to laugh when I found out I was doing the famous "sounding brass" reading - you'll know what I mean if you've ever watched the film "Four Weddings and a Funeral".

Here are the bride and groom, surrounded by their attendants, exchanging vows.

Here are the happy newly weds at the end of the ceremony!

Here's our entire family at the photo call.

Back outside, we waited patiently for the bride and groom to emerge. Here's the extended Sun family in front of the church.

Here we had a photo with mum and dad. I thought mum looked lovely in her blue silk outfit.

This is a photo my cousin Amy took of Lauren; I think she looks so beautiful in this picture with her hair coiled up. I was amazed that it had stayed in place this long!

And here are my darling girls with my mum and dad. They looked absolutely gorgeous in their little dresses (made by Jase's mum Suzanne).

After their photos were done, Hube and Bonnie emerged from the church.

We were there waiting to greet them with a soft shower of bubbles!

Here's the happy couple with Bonnie's lovely parents looking on.

Out in front of the church, Hubert posed with me and his cousins.

Soon after this, Hube and Bonnie were whisked away in their vintage car and we made our way to the reception. The reception hall was about 30 minutes away by car; really lovely inside with a foyer containing fountains and sweeping double staircases.

In the photo above, I am trying to fold and shorten Bonnie's train into a bustle (eventually with some success)! Hube and Bonnie were one of three wedding receptions being held at the venue on the day; we were next door to a massive Bollywood style wedding, complete with gorgeous ladies in colourful saris.

Once safely inside our hall, we found our table and settled the girls. We were all starving; the girls hadn't eaten since breakfast because of their lunchtime nap and it was now about 6pm. Jase and I had had a very small lunch because we were in a hurry to get the girls ready. Needless to say, we all made short work of the canapés, which were all delicious. Lauren wolfed down about three or four chicken satays, whilst Jocey ate her baby food. I think in this photo Mum was feeding me a little piece of quiche!

Hube and Bonnie arrived with the wedding party to take their seats, looking happy and relaxed. Here, they greet the top table before sitting down.

I was quite surprised that they decided to cut the cake and have the speeches first - obviously quite different from weddings in the UK. Also different was the fact that the chief bridesmaid stood up to speak and not the father of the bride.

Their cake was really modern and pretty, and (of course as it is Bonnie's favourite) chocolate. We were served the cake for dessert and it was really good. In fact the whole dinner was surprisingly good especially when you consider the problems of mass catering and the standard of food normally served at a wedding. The only pity was that the desserts were tucked away in a corner and very few people had any of the lovely treats on offer (I think because many didn't know the desserts were there).

All throughout the wedding, the girls behaved impeccably. I was so proud of them. They laughed and smiled the whole day and were both so beautiful!

I think they enjoyed the day as much as we all did. Lauren in particular had a great time playing with Ruaraidh, the Best Man's son and the ring bearer.

When it was time for the dancing, everyone got up to do a turn around the dance floor. Of course, the bride and groom went first.

They were followed onto the dance floor by the attendants.

The parents quickly followed.

Then Lauren thought it would be fun and dragged Ruariadh onto the dance floor. Good for her!

Unfortunately, we had to leave the party in full swing as the girls were getting very tired and needed to go to bed. We said our goodbyes to everyone and went to our room in the hotel to put the girls to bed.

Mum and Dad stayed on and had a fantastic time. When the girls were in bed, we managed to spend some time chatting with my uncle, aunties and cousins before they left for the night. We returned to our own room at about midnight - the end of a wonderful wedding and a wonderful day.

The photos from the day can be seen here in my Flickr album.

Trip to Chicago: Part II, The Rehearsal and Rehearsal Dinner

2008-09-29T08:30:00.000+10:00

High time I actually talked about the wedding.

We were all getting a bit worried as the weekend of the wedding got closer as Hube and Bonnie still had quite a lot of organising to do before the big day. There was a lot of last minute rushing about behind the scenes! However, we were all determined that things should try to go as smoothly as possible, so we headed out to the rehearsal on Saturday full of expectation.

The priest's assistants were very helpful and talked and walked us through quite a complicated rehearsal. As someone who had never been to a Catholic wedding before, I was interested to see all the ceremony and intricacies that make up a Catholic service. I was hoping by the end of it that we would all remember what we had to do. My particular worry was that Lauren wouldn't manage to walk down the aisle in her role as the flower girl if she was too nervous or too tired; young children are so unpredictable!

After the rehearsal, we all headed out to an Italian restaurant called Maggiano's near my Great Uncle's house for the rehearsal dinner. The family had hired out a private room downstairs in the restaurant for the dinner, complete with its own bar. Here are my parents with our extended family.

Here we are at our table with my parents, Hubert and Bonnie, Aunt Kitty and cousin Monica.

The meal was fantastic; it was American Italian food and was full of flavour. We all had a great time and we managed to spend some time talking to our extended family. I hadn't seen my Uncle or my cousin Deanna since 1997, so it was really fabulous to see them there.

Lauren and Jocey loved it; they got cuddles with so many different people and were generally fussed over. Lauren got a Dora backpack from Hube and Bonnie as a thank you present. She immediately wanted to put it on and go exploring, just like Dora!

Here's Jocey with mum and looking at Great Uncle Larry.

Here I am with mum and the girls, at the end of the meal.

After the meal, the girls were tired out because they had missed out their lunchtime nap; we headed off back to the hotel so that the girls could sleep. I wasn't sure how they would manage on the wedding day but was hopeful that if I got them down for a nap at lunchtime that they would last until the evening.

After such a big lunch, everyone had a quiet evening and we had dinner on our own at the next door Longhorn Steakhouse that night.

Trip to Chicago: Part I, pre-wedding fun

2008-09-23T08:01:00.000+10:00

I'm pleased to say that Jocey is finally getting better after coming down with her nasty cold. She ran a fever last night but slept well and went to nursery without incident today. Although she was quite upset when I dropped her off, she was fine after I left the room and played happily during the day.

Both girls are fast asleep at the moment so for the first time in ages I have the chance to write about the trip to Chicago.

We flew out on Saturday morning and landed Saturday afternoon (evening really) in Chicago. Both girls were very well behaved and did sleep a little on the plane. When they were awake they did not really fuss at all. I was really surprised considering it was the longest flight either of them had been on (and the first flight Jocey has ever been on). We were all tired when we arrived and just wanted to get to the hotel; unfortunately, it took about an hour to get through immigration. When we did eventually get to the desk, a grim looking man with no sense of humour looked at our passport, took our photos and got our fingerprints.

It does make you feel like a bit of a sneaky criminal! However, I was mindful of all the people who have been arrested and thrown into jail for "joking" with US immigration (for example, the man with the violin case who when asked what was in it thought it would be funny to say that it was a machine gun. He didn't laugh when they then arrested him and threw him into jail. Like I said, no sense of humour.)

After this, it took a considerable amount of time (about another hour) before we got our hire car because of paperwork and other nonsense. They actually gave us the wrong car at first; I realised it couldn't be the correct one as it was a 5 seater and not a 7 seater. This meant that by the time we finally did reach the hotel, we were pretty exhausted.

However, luckily for us the hotel we'd booked had a mall nearby with a big supermarket called Target (which strangely enough turned out to be a Tesco as it had all the Cherokee clothing) and lots of little restaurants. Adjacent to the hotel itself was a little steak place called Longhorn Steakhouse.

Now I know the Longhorn is a chain but I must admit that I was very pleasantly surprised to find that the steak was actually really good. The food was not fancy but what it did it did well. It was child friendly as well so a clear winner for the first night. To be honest, we hadn't had any high expectations for food on the holiday as we had been disappointed on previous trips to the US (more on the food later).

It was fabulous to see Hubert and Bonnie. It's been little over a year since we saw them last (in Barcelona). They were obviously tired and a bit stressed in the run up to the wedding as there was still quite a lot to sort out. However, we all had a good time catching up and spending time with them.

They had fun showing us around their neighbourhood. Their house had required a lot of work but is now lovely - really cosy and homely.

There are pictures of their house here.

The house is situated in a lovely suburb full of wide, leafy streets and nice houses. On one of the first few days, they took us to the local park at the end of their street. Here's Hube and Mum chatting.

Lauren and Jocey loved the park and spent a long time playing on the swings and climbing frames. Here Lauren was playing on a climbing frame which was in the shape of a boat and she is at the helm.

Jocey loved the swings. She laughed and laughed whilst on them. She especially liked the swing below because I think she felt secure in the deep seats.

Here is Jocey on another swing with Hube.

And here is one of Hube, Dad, Mum and the girls enjoying the park.

The park was in immaculate condition; really clean, lots of good, fun equipment in it and no signs of any vandalism at all. So different from London. We went to our local park this weekend to find that one of the climbing frames had been roped off as it has a broken section. I have no idea when it will be fixed. I was quite surprised to hear from Bonnie that their local council change all the playground equipment every few years and replace it with all new stuff. Now why can't we get that here? It really put our playgrounds to shame.

Adjacent to the children's playground is a little wilderness with a small wildlife centre in it. Unfortunately, we didn't have the opportunity to visit whilst we were there but saw a lot of the wildlife in the local area (squirrels, rabbits, birds, chipmunks and woodpeckers!). Jocey was enchanted by it all and spent a lot of time excitedly pointing and grunting at all the animals she saw. Lauren loved watching the squirrels chasing each other and got very excited when she saw all the rabbits.

Midweek, my family started to arrive from all over. We met up with my mum's two sisters and my cousin Margaret, whom I've not seen in 11 years. It was lovely to see her and do some catching up (sadly, we didn't have enough time as I would have liked, especially as I had to look after the girls a lot of the time). Here we are all agonising over the menu at a fish restaurant on the first evening together.

Both my aunts are over 70 but are still very young and in good health. Aunt Pei, the eldest of my mum's sisters is 74 and still plays tennis several times a week. She is absolutely incredible.

Here is a picture of three generations of Sun family women. I think my grandparents would be very proud had they still been alive to see it.

On the Thursday we went to see my Great Uncle Larry, which was really a fantastic experience. I'd only met him once before, very briefly when he was travelling around the world and had visited us in Edinburgh, about 10 years ago. He was my maternal grandmother's sister's husband; my Great Aunt died a few years ago.

As well as being a professor of architecture who has written books on the subject, he personally experienced the horrors of China's Cultural Revolution. He has written a book on his experiences and I was lucky enough to get a copy from him. It is a part of my family's history that I don't know much about but am keen to find out about.

He's absolutely amazing for a man in his 90s. Here he is with my mum, his niece.

It was the first time I had met any of my mum's cousins. It was also the first time she had met some of them too, as our family have been so scattered. Strange to think that there was such a large part of the family that we'd never met before. I was so glad to have had the opportunity to do so however. We went out to lunch with Great Uncle Larry and Aunty Si, one of his daughters.

Here is Great Uncle Larry with his daughter and his nieces.

He is the only surviving member of my mum's family from that generation. How wonderful to have met him and had the chance to spend some time talking with him. I'm hoping to have the opportunity to sit and read his book sometime soon, so that I can share in that part of my family's history. I think he was also happy to have had so many members of his family around him; he absolutely adored Lauren and Jocey and they clearly were in awe of him.

The pictures of our trip taken pre-wedding can be found here.

Germ warfare

2008-09-20T00:32:00.000+10:00

I've had to take the day off work today because Lauren and Jocey have been ill with colds this week. The schools have gone back and I am sure that this is a factor. Both girls came home on Monday with the sniffles which quickly developed into nasty coughs, sore throats and fevers. It seems to be going round at work too and although I have been fine, I think Jase is about to get it too.

They called me from nursery on Wednesday mid morning to say that Lauren had a fever of 39 and was vomiting. Unfortunately, I was the only boss in at work on the day so had to bring Lauren back to my work. She took some Calpol and some milk and went to sleep in my office without any fuss. At least when she woke up she was much perkier. She even liked meeting some of my work colleagues and watching the ambulances pull up.

Yesterday, Jase took the day off work to look after the girls so today it is my turn to stay home. Lauren has recovered but now Jocey has become unwell with the same thing.

However, despite the fever and the cold, she is in pretty good spirits. She has been playing and eating as she should, so I am less concerned. Here she is playing at home with me.

Here is Jocey giving her Eebee a big hug.

Eebee came back from Chicago with us as a birthday present from her Gung Gung and Po Po. She absolutely adores him!

He reminds me of the Fraggles - do you remember them?

I think he's actually quite cute, even if Jase is not sure. Jocey chose him; she was absolutely besotted with him from the moment she clapped eyes on him in the shop.

At the moment, she is having a nap and I am sure that the sleep will do her good.

More on the trip to Chicago and all the rest of the news when I get a moment to draw breath. I feel as if I am being carried along in a hurricane, tossed about from one spot to another. Always so little time!

Wedding Photos!

2008-09-03T10:23:00.003+10:00

I have created a wedding album on flickr.

Enjoy!

Quite a surprise!

2008-08-20T09:01:00.000+10:00

Much to my surprise this afternoon, Jocey started to walk with the help of Lauren's toy cart. We've tried on several occasions to get her to do this but always failed before as she didn't seem to know what to do. However, over the last couple of weeks I've noticed her get steadier on her feet.

So imagine how thrilled I was to see her do this today! She was clearly very pleased with herself too.

Lauren was much slower to get up and walk but then was premature and not as sturdy as Jocey. Obviously, Jocey also has Lauren as a role model to copy and follow. I've noticed that Jocey gets increasingly frustrated with staying still; she obviously wants to be up and running with Lauren around the house.

I honestly can't wait to see it!

There are more videos of Jocey's first steps here.

Lauren's three 3rd birthday parties

2008-08-20T08:44:00.001+10:00

Lauren had three 3rd birthday celebrations, even more than the Queen. Her first birthday bash was held in the last weekend that my parents were in London, exactly one week before her actual birthday. She was so happy!

My mum insisted on getting a really nice cake for her from one of the cake shops in Chiswick - this chocolate one got the thumbs up from everyone. Here I am with the birthday girl and her cake.

Here's all of us around the cake. I think Jocey was quite keen to get started on the eating bit!

The candles were the ones that spontaneously relight; she was really puzzled by it all but dutifully tried blowing the candles out each time. After four such attempts, Daddy doused the candles with water as everyone was dying to try the cake!

Here's birthday girl with birthday cake.

Lauren then took a cake in to her nursery for her classmates on the Friday before her birthday. However, she wouldn't let them cut it for some reason (maybe because she liked it so much; it was in the shape of a little piggy) and they are planning to have the cake tomorrow.

On the actual day of her birthday last weekend, Jason's parents and Aunty Madge came to stay with us. They made her feel really special and made a big fuss over her, which she loved.

I baked a vanilla sponge cake with vanilla butter icing and strawberry jam in the middle. It was a huge success (thanks to a very simple Jane Asher recipe) and possibly the lightest sponge I've baked for some time. I was really pleased with it and I think Lauren was also suitably impressed!

After the candle was blown out (a normal one this time), she helped me cut the cake and she dived into the first slice.

Jocey also happily tucked into birthday cake with Grandma!

Lauren clearly had a wonderful time at each birthday celebration. I can't believe my little girl is three years old!

Child's play

2008-08-20T08:15:00.001+10:00

I've noticed that Lauren has developed real "play" in the last year. When she was little, she explored things but her attention span was too short to really stay with anything for long and I could see that imaginative play didn't really happen. However, during the course of this year, she started doing the "pretend" stuff and it has become increasingly complex in nature.

Currently, her two favourite pretend games are putting her dollies and animals to "sleep" and going "shopping". The putting to bed ritual involves changing pretend nappies, feeding, burping and then tucking into bed (bizarrely always face down - I think she gets this from nursery where I've observed they tend to sleep them on their fronts or their sides. I've tried to tell Lauren that she should put her dollies to sleep on their backs, but maybe that's just me being too serious and bringing my doctor role home!). She then sits next to them for long periods of time patting them on their backs and telling me "Shush, Mummy. Babies sleeping!". I love watching her do this.

Shopping involves taking her little pink handbag and asking us what we need. I give her a list of things to get and she trundles off to her imaginary shop to pick them up, sometimes with Babies in tow. She always returns to put the imaginary fruit or vegetables in my hand at the end of it.

She also plays with Jocey, although Jocey isn't always sure of how to play with Lauren yet. Here are the two girls in our beach tent, which I erect in the garden on sunny days.

I think sometimes they get a bit frustrated with each other because Jocey doesn't understand what Lauren wants to do and Lauren thinks that Jocey isn't playing "properly". However, the vast majority of the time they seem to be happy together and clearly love each other very much.

Their current favourite game together is jumping on our bed. Lauren runs upstairs, clambers on and starts trampolining on our bed. I take Jocey up and bounce her up and down as if she were trampolining too. This is always accompanied by gales of laughter. It always finishes with the two of them "falling over" in a very exaggerated way. Jocey even does the flopping back on my bed when Lauren is not there now and bursts into laughter when she does.

I can't help laughing too, even though I know the springs stick out a bit more on my bed now...

Family life

2008-08-20T07:53:00.000+10:00

In some ways I think the title is slightly ironic as at the moment it is a constant struggle to have a family life. I find I am trying so hard to get the balance between work and family right but still finding myself working 11 to 12 hour days. People tell me that I must be doing something "wrong" but unfortunately I suspect it's just that I care too much about things to leave stuff undone.

Despite all this my girls seem happy and well adjusted; proof of the robustness of children and that working parents often beat themselves up over things too much. I suspect that the person who loses out the most is not them (as when I am at home they have 100% of my time and we have happy Tuesdays together) but me. I find myself frequently exhausted, a situation not improved by the fact that I am still up between 2 and 5 times a night with the girls. There are times when I get up for work and wonder how I will make it through the day as I am so worn out. Happily, I tend to get my second wind in the afternoon; I have never been a "mornings" person.

All that does not mean that I accept my lot in life; I am determined to find a way to improve my work-life balance. I long for the time when I can go home at a reasonable time and spend time with the girls like everyone else is entitled to. I don't think that it will ever happen in London though. The quality of life here is truly awful; the only people who think living in London is good are either people who are a bit bonkers or who don't have to live here.

Despite this, there are times when you experience islands of calm in the stormy seas. My parents were down staying with us for just over 2 weeks at the end of July and beginning of August. They were here to help out Jason and Charlotte with their new baby George. However, they somehow found the time to help us out too and we really enjoyed having them here with us.

We held a dinner at our house for Jason, Charlotte, George and Charlotte's parents to welcome the new baby into the family. It was a glorious evening and we had the doors to the garden open the whole night.

I think everyone genuinely had a great time; we all talked and laughed and enjoyed good food. We also had the opportunity to spend a little time with the new arrival too.

Here I am with Lauren, giving George a cuddle.

Below is my Mum and Dad with all their grandchildren.

Children make the entire struggle worthwhile. I am so thankful every day that I have my beautiful girls to come home to.

Mahmahwah and bahbahwah

2008-07-21T08:24:00.001+10:00

Over the last two days, Jocey has suddenly found her voice. Since our holiday in Lyme Regis, we've noticed a big change in her. It was the same with Lauren after out trip to St Malo - I'm not sure if this is just coincidence or whether it is due to the fact that they had just reached that point in their development where they were ready to take off.

Since coming home, Jocey has become suddenly very mobile. She's no longer content to stay happily in one spot playing with toys. She crawls at speed around the room investigating every nook and cranny. However, she loves standing up even more. She's constantly trying to pull herself up on the furniture to a standing position, and she even walks short distances holding onto furniture.

When she does this, she always looks so pleased with herself and gives us all such beaming smiles.

Over the last two days, I was surprised to hear her suddenly try to talk. I thought I had misheard the other morning when she said "Mahmah" when I left the room.

She didn't do it again that day so I assumed it had been wishful thinking on my part.

However, yesterday and today we have had many "mahmahwah"s and "wahmahwah"s and even some "bahbahwah"s and "wahbahwah"s.

Jase and I were both very pleased and decided it was a draw. What a clever girl! I must try to take some film of her standing up soon.

Country Fair

2008-07-21T08:04:00.001+10:00

Last weekend, we went to a country-style fair on Richmond Green. We had so much fun; there were farm animals, fairground rides and games and stalls of yummy food and goodies to buy.

Lauren absolutely loved it. She kept calling it "circus" and enjoyed going on the tamer rides.

We went on a merry-go-round but even I regretted it eventually as it whirled at a frightening rate of knots when it got up to speed. We were in high spirits when we first got on though...!

We had a picnic lunch on the grass; Lauren and Jocey clearly enjoyed it. From our vantage point, we could see the donkey giving rides to the hoards of excited children. Jocey was really quite fascinated by all the farm animals.

Later on in the afternoon, Lauren and I tried out some of the circus tricks. I wasn't up to the juggling; one lad there managed to keep seven balls up in the air at once. We were all really impressed. However, the walking on stilts was more our thing.

Lauren even tried out the plate twirling, and with some success.

I think you can even see that lad still showing off his juggling prowess in the background. I only had eyes for my little girl though!

All in all, a good day out.

I'm an Auntie!

2008-07-21T07:48:00.001+10:00

I've been itching to report that I've become an auntie! My sister-in-law Charlotte gave birth to a big bouncing baby boy (9lb 6oz) on Friday morning. Both mum and baby are fine, although poor Charlotte is understandably still recovering from a marathon labour.

They've called the baby George, and here is a picture I took of him when I went to see them on Saturday. He's so laid back - just like my brother! Isn't he gorgeous?!

We can't wait to see them at home tomorrow. Lauren is so excited; she already knows his name and was able to tell me who he was when I showed her his picture again today. However, she doesn't quite understand the idea of a "cousin"; she kept asking me if he was her brother!!

Now that the happy parents have shared their news with the family I can finally publish this post. Hurray!

Car Jinx 2

2008-07-18T06:33:00.000+10:00

We've had really bad luck with cars this year. It all started in January when we had to take both cars into Kwik Fit on consecutive days with faults. We had thought that that episode was the end of it but unfortunately we were wrong.

Jase (through no fault of his own) was involved in a nasty accident a fortnight ago and his car was written off. Luckily he and the girls escaped serious harm, although initially I was worried as Lauren had some seatbelt bruising on the side of her neck. However, she was fine after some Calpol so I was less concerned after that.

Bizarrely, on the very next day Jase was taking us all to nursery / work when my car developed a flat tyre. He had to change it by the roadside and limp on the spare tyre to a Kwik Fit in Hounslow. Astonishingly, we ended up having to get 3 new tyres to replace the flat and the other two which had not been affected by the blow-out back in January. All the tyres had been developing large cracks in them which would have caused them to eventually blow.

Sadly, all this has meant that we've had to replace Jase's car ahead of time. After the starter motor was replaced, we had hoped that we would get another year's use out of the car at least.

As you can see from the photos though, the damage to Jase's car was too extensive and would have cost about £3000 to repair. The insurance people have therefore written off the car and have given us £700 for the wreck.

This does not get you very far when buying a replacement. We've had to get some money from the bank and from family to buy a new car, as Jase needs a car to commute to work.

After a lot of research, we've decided to buy a Citroen C4 Grand Picasso, a 7 seater people carrier. It's had really good reviews from car magazines and is the greenest car in its class. The one we've bought is dark blue like the one in this picture.

Initially I was quite intimidated by its size as close up it looks absolutely massive. However, I was pleasantly surprised that despite being a big car it handled and accelerated well during the test drive and was comfortable, even in the third row of seats.

We pick up the new car this Saturday and we are all very excited!

More climbing frame fun

2008-07-17T08:20:00.001+10:00

Last week, I took Lauren and Jocey to Bramley's on my day off as the weathermen had forecast rain for most of the day. We braved the buses and tube trains again, much to Lauren and Jocey's delight.

When we got there, Lauren instantly disappeared for several minutes into the depths of the climbing frame, and even found some little girls to play with. She really enjoyed following them around and crawling in and out of the giant tubes with them.

Since our last visit, Jocelyn has learned to crawl and to stand up so even she was having fun in the soft play area exploring the different toys.

They both had lots of fun playing but after a while got quite grumpy and wanted to eat. I ordered some cod goujons for her with chips and baked beans whilst I had a chicken burger with salad.

To my surprise, Lauren took an interest in the baked beans by dipping her chips into the sauce (although she wasn't too keen to eat the actual beans). For a long time, Lauren had not been too keen on tomato sauces, thus my surprise. I was even more surprised to find that she then wanted to try dipping her chips into my tomato ketchup, and that she liked it.

Despite my best efforts though, she was not interested in the fish but did end up eating most of the chicken from my chicken burger. I was left to hoover up the scraps she didn't eat!

I suspect we will go more when the weather takes a turn for the worse in the autumn and winter. It was a fun day out for us all, even if we were all knackered when we got home.

Sun, swimming pool and sand

2008-07-02T07:29:00.000+10:00

It's been a glorious sunny day today; odd, because the forecast was only for 25 degrees Celsius but it felt a lot hotter than this out and about.

The girls and I have had a good day. We met up with some of my friends this morning for coffee in Chiswick. I was very proud of Lauren and Jocey - they were well behaved and only got restless after about an hour. I then had to bale out and say my goodbyes to let Lauren run about in the Park Club.

She loves going to the Park Club. We were there at the weekend with Jason and Charlotte; they've just joined the club because they were also really impressed with its facilities and activities for children. Charlotte is almost at full term now in her pregnancy but hopefully will be able to manage a few lazy days by the outdoor pool before the baby comes.

I tried taking some pictures of the girls in the swimming pool when we went on Sunday. I did manage to get some lovely ones of Lauren with Jase.

Here is Lauren splashing!

However, it wasn't long before I got told off by the lifeguard who told me that there was a no camera policy in the pool, even though I was taking pictures of my own daughter and no one else was in shot (or even close!).

When he went off for a drink, I tried to take some of Jocey but the poor girl was not happy in the pool and cried on the photos. I wasn't able to get in the pool on Sunday because I was on call for my department and I didn't want to be in the pool if I got called by work. I think she wasn't used to the fact that I wasn't in with her.

Today, we followed our usual Tuesday ritual of going to play in the large sand pit at the Park Club, which the girls greatly enjoy.

Both Lauren and Jocey spent quite some time building and destroying sand castles, making sand "cakes" for me to eat and digging holes.

The sun was blazing down and I made sure they had plenty of sun cream on; however, getting them to keep their hats on was a bit more challenging!

After lunch Lauren and I went to play on the climbing frame whilst Jocey had a snooze in the shade. Whilst we were there Lauren made friends with a little girl called Sophia, who was there with her nanny (her mum appeared to be somewhere in the club but doing other things - at one point the nanny pointed the mummy out somewhere in the distance).

Sophia was five and very keen to show Lauren how to do everything. She encouraged Lauren to go on the big slide, the swings, the trampoline thingy and they even tackled the assault course together. Lauren had lots of fun and talked to Sophia quite a lot. By four o'clock though, Lauren was getting tired and I had to take her home. Sophia was really sad to see her go, but I told her and her nanny that we would be back there next Tuesday (and indeed most Tuesdays).

Do children grow up lonelier these days? I remember as a child playing with our neighbours' children on the street and being allowed to go by myself to friends' houses even if their houses were several streets away. Obviously, I wouldn't let my children do this, even if they were a bit older - not in London anyway.

Maybe it's not only our children; I have found it harder to keep up with friends whilst living in London as everywhere is so difficult to get to and life is so frantic.

Strange that you can feel alone even when every minute of the day you are surrounded by people.