week sixteen

Week sixteen............





Travelled up to Croughton to spend the day at the new house that we are hoping to buy - Rob had arranged for lots of builders to come over to do quotes...Nelly and I played in the garden and the lady that owns the house told us she will leave the swing and slide as well as the cute little Wendy House! It was another lovely day up there and it was good to the place again. In the afternoon we headed over to our frineds in Towcester to stay - Nelly and Lilly played together really well and were seen hugging and holding hands - a turn around from last week ! She has learnt how to blow kisses from when we stayed with Clare. The next morning Nelly and Lilly collected the eggs from Sara's three chickens and they had scrambled egg for their breakfast! If we get this house - we are having an Egglu too - we think a purple one would look nice!


First for me - this week leaving Nelly with Rob all afternoon while I went off to meet a guy about some work. I should be able to do 4 - 6 days a month and with Rob not working at the moment then he can spend some quality Daddy time with Nelly....

Nelly has been waking very early this last week - I mean really early like 4.30am! far to early even for me - so I decided to try and stop her having an afternoon nap which meant taking her to the Brockwell Park one o clock club ( after Gymbabes ) and letting her run around all afternoon before spending time on the swings.......she slept like a baby that night and woke up at a reasonable time hungry...

Since her inauguration in the shower at the swimming pool I have started to take Nelly with me into the shower - she loves it!







Flat out after a hard morning playing....
All those toys and nothing better than a cardboard box as a car!

Egg Collection!
collecting eggs in my pjs!

Scrambled egg fresh from the hens...

week fifteen

Been real slow updating the blog ....week fifteen we were still with my sister, Nelly still having a love in with the cows and we took her into Beth and Anna's school for half an hour at the end of the day. She was the centre of attention that she loved!

Another first was a trip to the swimming pool - I was a real coward and waited until I had an experienced Mum to go with 9 My sister! Thanks Clare ) she liked it , did not cry once and mostly loved being in the shower afterwards !

We travelled home again on the train and Nelly played with a beautiful Dalmatian ' hearing ' dog called Violet most of the way - she was very good on the journey , so trains are real winners!

At the end of that week Kate and Frank were up from Cornwall and we spent a lovely afternoon with them in the garden of The Mansion...then the Saturday we met up again before they headed home for Nelly's first visit to the Royal China Dim Sum Restaurant in Bayswater which she and we loved ...followed by a pootle around Hyde Park and the Diana garden.

She had her MMR on the Thursday - followed by lots of screaming and a trip to the swings to cheer her up!

We finally hooked up with the Bowles family - they were with us the day we met Nelly and they met their little girl Isabel...we went to Chingford and had a lovely lunch followed by a long walk in the forest - Nelly and Isabel played together for a while Nelly more interested in the older boys! She was going through that phase of pushing and pulling with children her own age rather than loving ...!


Frank up from Cornwall ...in a beer gArden with Nelly

Team Norton - out for an afternoon drink!

That excited little giggle..................

Playing in the Princess Diana Memorial Garden - looks like we are on holiday ..........

Lunch with my friend Isabel ........and her big brothers Harry and James

Isabel and I playing nicely for five minutes!

Nelly in Beths classroom...Beth poking her head in to make sure she was alright....

Nelly at school...

Taking in some reading...

week fourteen

Still catching up with the blog!............we spent week fourteen

The week started with the May Day Bank Holiday weekend, on the Saturday we had planned to meet up with our good friend Emma but she had to cancel so we headed off to Nelly' favourite for lunch - Wagamamas and then to the Tate Modern....

On the Sunday it was our neighbours son's second birthday picnic in Dulwich Park so there was lots of running around and eating, at one point I turned around to talk to someone and by the time I turned back she was stuffing handfuls of crisps into her mouth with both hands!! Needless to say she was sick in the night! oh well we all over indulge at some points in our life.....

Bank Holiday Monday we took Nelly up to meet our friends who live in Aldbury, who are emigrating to Australia at the end of the year - the rain poured down as we drove up the MI then as we got there the sun came out and we had a great day as there was a village Fair. Nelly got to meet black sheep, goats, rabbits, mice, guinea pigs....we then had tea back at Kerry and Neils and got very jealous looking at one of the houses they have looked at in Oz!

We had our usual monthly lunch in the Junction, Nelly was a bit off colour and at that point I had totally lost my voice...so I guess she was getting sick again!

Another first for Nelly that week was her trip on the train to Cheshire where I would stay with my sister on the farm; the journey is about 1 hour 45 minutes, and was bearable except the final fifteen and then she fell fast asleep! She loved being on the farm and her fascination with cows ( she loves a Cow glove puppet that we bought her it is called Mavis , and her favourite programme on CBeebies after the Night Garden is a short story called Blue Cow ! ) did not diminish, every morning she looked out of the windows and mooed! before asking to go out into the garden to play on the swings and tramploine..

My nieces have been desperate to see these pictures on the blog - so here they are ...all of her class had been following the progress of our trip to China to meet Nelly so Nelly went into the school to see all of the teachers - she disrupted a number of classes on two occasions! We were at Clare's for five days so the end of week fourteen and into week fifteen. She did miss Rob at first when she realised that he was not in the bed on the Saturday morning! We then downloaded skype on Clare's PC and got a webcam so we could see each other! she loved that. Every day she was on the swings and trampoline and being mothered by her two cousins

We met other cousins whose wives had both had babies in January so it was lovely to see Nelly with babies

Nelly meets some more second cousins - Jack and Daisy ....

Nelly meets baby Daisy Blake....

Nelly and Molly hanging out at Clapham Junction station after a ladies lunch!

Nelly and her cousin Anna at breakfast



Nelly meets the calves ..

Nelly and the black sheep of the family! Aldbury May Day Fair

Nelly at teh Aldbury Many Day Fair

Fraser at Kamran's 2nd birthday party in Dulwich park...

Nelly sleeping on the sofa with Daddy...


On the train to Borough Market and the Tate

Nelly and Fraser using the scooter

week thirteen

Well she has been with us for three months plus now...still behind on the blog update but hey - I am getting round to it...

Week thirteen saw a visit to the clinic on the Thursday to have her first lot of jabs, both thighs with the largest needle I have seen but that could be due to the size of her little leg...she was fie after the jabs thanks to Calpol... although I think she probably had a cold afterwards as she has had a permanent runny nose for weeks!

We made the dicovery of what is known as One O Clock CLubs - sounds like something that seniors do in the afternoon with tea and cakes! but almost - places in parks thorughout London where parents with children under the age of four can go to meet other people and children can run around, play on toys, paint, draw, play in sandpits etc etc. We had decided to meet other frineds in the park for a picnic and stumbled on the Battersea Park One o clock club! WOW! Nelly and Plum had a great time and Susan and I managed to sit down for a cup of tea and chat while they played !

Rob introduced Nelly to Elvis! see images of her watching the video of Elvis and Celine Dion...! ( courtesy o clever editing for American Pop Idol...if I was really clever I would put a link in but cannot be bothered....)


Oh week thirteen of Nelly being at home also saw our thirteenth wedding anniversary! no big celebrations, just family time!!... except the plans for us to move out of London accelerated...we put an offer in on a house in Norhtants,....and it was accepted ! Watch this space...............




Nelly Battersea Park beginning of May...

Nelly on her new trike in Dulwich Park ......

Oh No Daddy- is this Elvis!
...OK I like it really !

week twelve

Been a bit lax on updating the blog - so this is a quick walk through of the last few weeks...
week twelve we had out very good friend Sara and her little girl Lilly to stay for a few days , the sun was sort of shining and we spent the day at the hornimans museum , some of the best entertainment is hidden away in small local museums, we had a great day playing instruments, in the aquarium looking at fish, sea horses etc and eating lunch in the cafe...

This was the week that we discovered that Nelly is really suffering from hayfever, we went to lucilles party on a windy sunny Saturday afternoon in Eal's Court and her poor eyes streamed and streamed , we bought Piriton on the way home and she slept very well indeed!

Week twelve saw us getting our first babysitter! A friend was celebrating her 40th birthday and we arranged for our cleaner Ganka to look after Nelly for the evening.....we spent the afternoon dashing around the park tiring her out, Rob ran around the garden with her for 15 minutes before collecting G to babysit so that she would be asleep by 7 30 and it all worked! She was fast asleep in bed by 7 20 and I was ready in matching heels, bag and nail varnish by 7 30! we had a great evening and had to dash at midnight when we realised the time! no lingering over a final glass of wine any more !!!




If I suck hard on this pot it sticks to my face....vacuum discovered...!

This looks interesting....

OK I put those pegs somewhere...

drums - a real favourite....

So ...you were out last night then Mama ...not seen this bag before looks fun...goes with the shoes!

Happy First birthday Lucille...

Good party guys...fiona, rinus and nina

Nelly en route to the party...

Lilly and Nelly discovering interesting drains..

Big Girls on the step!