Lightning Raybans

Joshua now has his own shades ready for the great British summer. Check out the new Lightning McQueen sun glasses. What a dude.

Shades on, phone in hand................

To further add to the cool image Joshua has started wearing his baseball cap back to front. This is not something we have done, he does this himself and often it is the only way he will wear his hat.

Here are some more pictures of Brandon getting some exercise in the door bouncer. There are still no signs of this first tooth despite the constant dribbling. I think it might be coming through the back but can't be sure just yet. He is still eating very well and has now started on carrots as well as his sweet potato and pears. He pretty much will eat what ever you put in front of him and so far the weening process has been a lot easier than with Joshua. With all this eating he is really becoming a right little chunkster and has now doubled his weight from his birth weight.

As you can see Brandon's hair has started to go a lot lighter than when he was first born.

Watch out there's a Joshia about!

A rare family shot of all four of us on the swings. Brandon is in the harness on my lap and Joshua is on Tina's lap.

Duathlon

Want to come for a ride in my new wheels. The two boys have been spoilt again as Mummy and Daddy bought them a twin seater bike trailer/jogger. This trailer is really cool as it has built in brakes and can be used as a 3 wheel jogger or a 2 wheel bike trailer. Therefore I can now take my boys out running and biking with me (maybe we could even enter a Duathlon). Awesome. The main reason for buying this was for when we go on holiday later in the year, but I am sure it will get plenty of use between now and then.

Anyway here is Joshua testing it out whilst I was trying to hook up the brakes.

This is 3 wheeler jogger mode with Joshua in the center seat as a single seater.

And this one is the same jogger mode but as a double seater. Brandon is a tad too small to be strapped in yet, but by the time we go on holiday he should be fine. Behind the seat is a useful storage area.

Once the boys were in bed I removed the front wheel and hooked the trailer up to the bike. I figured it is best I give it a good road/safety test without any passengers to make sure everything was OK. Hopefully tomorrow I will take Joshua out in it properly and see how he enjoys being towed along. Do you like the red safety flag, I think we might have to replace this with a Union Jack or St Georges Cross.

And don't go get any ideas about 1 seat on the front of the bike and two in the trailer. 2 is enough............

Here is the beast all hooked up, I think the total length is longer than the Galaxy shown in the background. It certainly fills up the garage!

And once the boys are all grown up - I can use it as a super duper wheel barrow...........or as my mobility wheels for the boys to push their old man around!!!!!!

Fathers Day @ Brands Hatch

Before I get into the exploits of our Fathers Day the latest hot news about Brandon is that his first tooth is coming through. The top right is clearly visible which explains all the dribbling, crying and fingers in the mouth over the last week. If only the poor fellow new he had to go through this many more times yet!!!

So onto Fathers Day. Well I am pleased to report that my boys took the hints well and raided their money boxes to buy their Dad the UFC game on the PS3 - result!!!! In return I took them out for the day to Brands Hatch to watch some motor racing. My friend from work, Alex, was racing there again in the kit car championship.

The MAD racing crew kindly let Joshua play in "Kermit" the race car. But boy did we have some temper tantrums when it was time to get him out. Of course then Joshua seemed to think that the paddock was Toys R Us and that he could just hop in and out of all the race cars. Needless to say we had our hands full with the little guy. He went dashing over to every race car in the paddock shouting "brum brum" and signalling to be lifted inside!

"Brum, brum"

Brandon tried to get in on the action but Joshua was not sharing the drivers seat one little bit.

He even tried climbing in "Dukes of Hazard" style only to be pushed away by his bigger brother.

Could this be a future race car champion in the making????? Nice ten to two hand position on the steering wheel.

Joshua adjusting all the mirrors ready for his race around the paddock (sorry Alex!).

A nice picture of Mummy with Brandon. The little guy was a bit confused at the noise of the Formula 4 cars going around the track.

Daddy and Brandon overlooking the paddock bend during one of the many races of the day.

Back at the grand stand Joshua had space to run around a bit and watch the cars tear down the main straight.

As usual he also made some new friends - the little guy will just chat to anyone and everyone.

Here is Joshua watching the kit car race with Alex's little boy, Oliver.

At the end of the day it was time for some ice cream. Joshua managed to get this absolutely everywhere. I think it blended in nicely with all the grease and dirt he had picked up from playing around the race cars!

Anybody would think he was about to have a shave give all the white stuff around his mouth. Still he looks happy. Once finished with the ice cream Joshua found it amusing to flick it from side to side further covering himself, me and Tina.

Chunky Monkey

Well as Shahinah would say - "chunky monkey". Yes that would appear to be the nickname for Brandon and fully justified too. At today's weigh in the little chap topped a whopping 13lb 9oz!!! His eating has been going very well and since he has done so well with the pear over the last week, today we introduced him to sweet potato. He managed to eat a whole bowl full for lunch and dinner! Check out the belly............

Daddy try to help the little chap out with his rolling onto the belly. He can get to his side on his own, but can't quite make the last 90 degrees.

Here is a nice shot of Brandon playing with his new toy which he got from Old MacDonalds Farm last weekend.

And here is the other one - still rehearsing for the X-factor trials!!!!

Most of the time Joshua is still very loving to his brother. In fact usually the first words out of Joshua's mouth each morning are "brother". Anyway here is a shot of Joshua blowing raspberry's on Brandon's tummy!

MacDonalds

Right sit down with a cup of tea and put your feet up folks, because this is a long blog update. So firstly lets get some generic stuff out of the way. Brandon is becoming a bit of a porker lately as we have got him eating pear 3 times a day now. This has also helped his sleeping as we are now managing to get him down at around 7 to 7.30 in the cot in the nursery room. For the first time in nearly 5 months we have had two evenings where both the boys have been asleep all evening and we have had some time to ourselves. On Friday Brandon also had his next lot of injections and this was the first time I have not been there as I had too much on with work.

For Tina's birthday last week we all went out for a nice meal and Joshua stuffed his face with fish and chicken. During the meal he also learnt to use a straw with his drink for the first time. 50% of the time he was flicking the straw, but he did drink with it occasionally. Also yesterday Joshua had a little fall down the David Lloyd and managed to stick his bottom two teeth through his lip. Lots of blood and a nasty cut, but he soon shook it off. The lip does not look great so we will keep a close eye on it over the next day or so in case it shows any signs of infection or not healing.

Anyway onto some fun pictures. Today we had a family day out and took the boys to Old MacDonalds Farm. The day was absolutely fantastic and I loved every minute of it. Joshua was an absolute blast and thoroughly enjoyed his day. Although despite wearing his hat and having factor 50 sun lotion we think he has a mild case of sun stroke. The farm itself is awesome with loads and loads of activities for the kids. In all we spent about 5 hours there which was a long time given that it was 26-27 degrees outside.


The first animal we saw was these little pony's which are right at the entrance to the farm.


Then there were some piggies - and I don't mean Joshie as he has hardly eaten a thing today.

Face to face with a bit of an unusual farm animal.


And look at this beautiful owl.

Every now and then it was time to sit down and recharge the batteries.

Joshua always seems to find these sit-on rides no matter where we go.............

And there was also a little ball park with air guns which we had a good blast in. The question in the picture below is: Is the blue ball floating because of air from the yellow thing or because of a rear end wind from Joshua????

Mummy and Joshua on the merry-go-round..........

Daddy and Joshie on the train - check out the grunge cow in the background!

After all that activity it was time to cool off with a nice ice cream. Joshie's face and t-shirt did not stay clean for long! He even got the ice cream in his ear!!!!

A small bouncy castle. Not quite up to the standards of Lisa's 80's themed bouncy castle but still fun.

Then it was onto the helta-sketler with Dad. With sack in hand we headed for the top where it was a bit wobbly to say the least.

Coming down I managed to rub my arm along the side to buffer Joshie and got a nice burn. Reminiscent of years ago when uncle David took me down a similar ride and managed to burn the back of my hand on the side rail!

OK, so far its all been about Joshie, but that's because Brandon slept a lot today. He did wake up to see a few of the animals as with this little goat below.

Me, Brandon and Joshie posing in front of a spiderman design of cow.

These little tractors were fab. Both Joshua and Brandon both enjoyed being push around by Dad. Of course Dad drew the short straw as it was pretty knackering whizzing the two boys around.

Let the race begin................on your marks...............get set....................GO!

And the winner is..................................Big B Brandon!

Joshua then took us all for a drive on a digger. He absolutely loved this sand pit play area and we had a real blast making snow balls with sand and destroying sand castles. Joshua was chuckling away like a good one.

This little goat found its way across the bridge.

And these two goats seemed very interested in Joshua.

OK pop quiz time..................spot Joshua in the picture below.

For those that couldn't spot him................... here is a close up.

Look at those beautiful deers in the background. Nice bench seat as well.

Mummy and Joshua sitting on one of the many decorated cows. Joshua seemed to call them all horsies.............still its another animal to his vocabulary instead of just dog, cat and duck!

The rabbit and guinea pig room is very well designed and the perfect height for Joshua to interact with the animals.

This little bunny escaped several times despite us picking him up and putting him back in his pen.

The escaped bunny seemed to take a liking to little Brandon whilst he was sleeping in the pram.

Joshua crossing a bridge..................all to get to the "play" area.

Towards the end of the day those little legs were getting tired so Dad had to carry Joshua a bit.

Anyway that's all folks. Hope you enjoyed the pictures. If you have kids then head to Old MacDonalds as it is a great day out and in a really beautiful part of Essex..........South Weald.