Tummy Time & Hollytrees Toy Museum

Poor little Holly had her second lot of immunisation injections on Monday and was certainly feeling a bit groggy and grizzly afterwards. She seems to have bounded back now though. Just lately we have been trying to give her a bit more tummy time in order to start encouraging her to learn to roll. They say that babies typically learn to roll from front to back fairly easily and suddenly, but back to front is supposed to be far more difficult. As you can see she is starting to push up on her arms and certainly supports her head well.

 

Holly having tummy time on her play mat.

She has no chance of learning to roll when she is sandwiched by Josh and B.

All that tummy time clearly makes her very tired and she can sleep pretty much anywhere. The other night I even got her asleep on the hammock type of foot rest under her baby walker. Anyway after her tummy time she was very quick to fall asleep in her high chair. This is somewhat surprising as dinner time seems to be one of her favourite times as we have started giving her some milk chocolate buttons to suck on whilst we eat dinner.

Sound asleep in her high chair.

She won't even wake for her chocolate!

 

Bedtime with the boys has become real fun lately especially with Brandon as we have started making up our own stories. Basically we pick a subject and then each say a few sentences to build up part of a story before handing over to the next person to continue the story. Brandon seems to really enjoy this and bow asks to make up a story every night. Whenever I read to the boys when we get to the back of the book I always say "The End". Brandon obviously hears this as "Di End" and today at school he wrote a newspaper story and on the last page he wrote "Di End" - it did make me chuckle.

 

Also today Joshua had another school trip to Hollytree Toy Museum in Colchester. He seems to have had a good day and enjoyed it, however I haven't actually got much out of him in terms of what he saw except that it was like a big house. The poor lad really doesn't travel well though and he was sick twice on the coach on the way there - the only kid to be sick as well!

Joshua's year 1 school trip went to Hollytrees Toy Museum in Colchester.

 



Half Term Just Bounce

Well half term is over again. The boys have had a pretty full on time what with a day at the sporting village, a day at Paradise Wildlife Park, a day at Duxford Imperial War Museum, a Day on Norfolk and then on the final day of the school week they both went to the Just Bonce bouncy castle event at Bromfords school. Fortunately this time Brandon managed to survive the 3 hour session without knocking any teeth out, although it does sound like he had a few bumps, scrapes and tears. Anyway here aew a few pictures Tina managed to get whilst trying to look after Holly as well (unfortunately I was at work).

Joshua and Brandon taking some chill time on the bouncy castle.

Don't ask me what these cow type things are? But Joshua seems to be having fun.

And Brandon face plants his cow into the ground.

Joshua and Brandon all ready to decend down the death slide.

Joshua and Brandon all smiles as the line up for their go on the football game.

 

After 3 hours of bouncy castles Joshua is completely shattered and hits the sofa for some quality thumb sucking!!

Forest Glade 2 : 3 Bryon Redstars

Busy times at Joshua's Forest Glade football club lately and there is no let up on the friendly games over the coming weeks. Today we fielded 3 teams against a very strong and very organised team from Bryon Redstars. Joshua was captain for the first time and whilst his team lost a very close game, 3:2, he did score a stunning goal with a fast breakaway. He had two other great opportunities to score, one went slightly wide and one he hit with his left instead of his right foot! So close to another hatrick.

 

Captain Joshua drags his team to a windy and boggy five-a-side pitch.

Team GMB Captain Joshua proudly showing his "C" armband in a rather awkward looking pose!

Joshua and Jake get the action underway with the centre kick.

Joshua goes head to head with a player from the opposition.

Joshua makes one of his fast breaks from back behind the half way line and goes on to score a great goal.

Launching a last minute attack with Jake desperately trying to level the core at 3 all.

Team GMB for today's match consisting of Jake, Jamie, Lorne, Reily, Darcy, Josh and Owen.

 

Joshua actually played a very good game today. There are always areas for him to improve on, but he captained the team well and scored a good goal. He was a leading candidate for the Man of the Match medal but was pipped to the post by Darcy who played outstanding in goal in the first half and then scored a cracking penalty in the second half. Poor Joshua was almost in tears that I didn't pick him for the Man of the Match medal and couldn't understand why he didn't get it when he felt he was the best player. I guess this is the difficulty I am going to have over the coming years with being both a coach and a Dad that has got to appear impartial to my own son and fair to the rest of the team.

Manchester United

Houston we have a problem. Now I know I have never been a big football support or even much of a football player. But I am trying my best with the coaching of the Under 6's team at Forest Glade and furthermore I am trying to bring the boys up the best possible way I can. However with Brandon something seems to have really gone wrong. Poor Nanny will be rolling in her grave to see her former Chelsea loving grand-son wearing the Manchester United football kit. Just where did it all go wrong???????

 

Where did we go wrong? Brandon in his Manchester United football kit.

Norfolk Visit

So after our visit to Duxford we headed up to Norfolk so that Joshua, Brandon and Holly could spend some time with their second cousin Layla. We stayed overnight in a beautiful little B&B called Chestnut Villa and for the first time ever we had a large family room where all 5 of us were sleeping in the same room. At first it was hilarious and the novelty factor meant Joshua and Brandon were chatting away, looking out of the windows, getting up for drinks etc, but in no time at all they were sound asleep after a long tiring day and a late night. You would think that Holly waking up for her night feeds would disturb the boys sleep, however there was one major factor which completed shadowed this and gave me, Tina, Brandon and Holly a tough time getting some sleep. This factor was Joshua's friggin snoring!!!!!! Honestly he must have kept the whole Villa awake.

 

Anyway before I get into the Norfolk pictures, firstly I have a picture of Holly's place mat with her name on it. It is one of the 3D dinosaur mat's that we got for both the boys, but her one is a play on Triceroptops with the dinosaurs name being Hollytops. Don't ask me why the picture is upside down as it is not this way in the gallery and I have tried to re upload it 3 times with the same result.

 

Hollytops dinosaur place mat.

 

So after an interesting nights sleep we all woke up around 7am and got showered and dressed ready to head over to Auntie Chris's for the day. Holly got all dressed up in her beautiful little doggie dress that Uncle Michael and Auntie Lea bought her for Xmas.

What a stunner, she looks just beautiful in this dress.

Brandon and Layla playing play-doh in the kitchen.

Holly laying on the floor and grabbing her new rattle which we got her from paradise wildlife park.

Layla loved little Holly and thought she was soooo cute.

Poor Auntie Chris has a broken arm and was limited with what she could prepare in terms of a buffet lunch for everyone. However all was not lost as the kids all got stuck in and prepared most of the food and laid the table all by themselves.

Amber, Brandon, Joshua and Layla starting to get the lunch buffet all laid out.

Chopping up strawberries and laying them out in the fruit bowl.

Joshua and Brandon took their trunkies packed with some of their toys to play with. As it happens Layla also has a trunkie (the Ladybird one) and all 3 of them seemed to enjoy racing around on trunkies rather than playing with toys. In fact they even hooked all 3 together to make a train. Now we just need to sort out a new trunkie for Holly when she is a bit older.

Layla on her ladybird trunkie, Joshua on his Gruffalo trunkie and Brandon on his Tiger trunkie.

Just before hitting the road for the long journey home my cousin Clare got to meet little Holly for the first time. She hates having her picture taken especially as she had come straight from work at the kennels and wasn't feeling very photogenic. But I did manage to snap a picture of her having a cuddle with Holly.

Cousin Clare meets Holly for the first time.

Duxford 2014

So this half term we decided to take the kids up to Norfolk to see their second cousin Layla-Grace as they are always coming down to us. However as its quite a long way to travel with 3 kids in the car we decided to make it an over night stop. So the plan was to have a day out somewhere en route, then travel up to Auntie Chris's, see them for a few hours, find a B&B or hotel, then spend some more time with them the next day before travelling back home in time for their Thursday night swimming lessons!!! Phew.

 

Anyway the for the en route day out we ended up at Duxford Imperial War Museum as this is roughly half way to Auntie Chris's. Upon arrival we was surprised and somewhat disappointed to find out the main hanger was closed off due to roof damage from the recent storms and winds. However as there are another 8 hangers to explore and the tickets price was reduced then we decided to still go ahead with our visit. So as per usual Brandon was our little map man navigating us from hanger to hanger.

 

My little map man.

The two boys are absolutely obsessed with Disney Planes right now and in fact they watched the movie in the car whilst driving to Duxford. So as we were walking around the hanger it became a bit of a game to find as many of the characters from the Disney movie as we could. Would you believe it, hanger two we found a blue Corsair plane which as a dead ringer for good old Skipper out of the film. Furthermore me and Tina have dived on a shot down and sunk Corsair plane in Hawaii so it was good to share that story with them (they weren't impressed about the Moray Eel which we found living in the cockpit).

Joshua and Brandon meet Skipper.

Little B trying on a pilots captain hat.

Another character from the film, a dead ringer for Dusty Crop Duster.

Joshua and Brandon standing in front of an old truck that looks like Chug from Disney Planes.

No character from Planes here, just Brandon standing in front of a helicopter which had a penguin painted on the side.

I think I have mentioned before on the blog that my favourite plane is the Blackbird SR-71 which is located in hanger 7. I described the plane to the boys and let them seek it out to see if they could find it for me. Bingo. They were very interested when I was telling them about its world record speeds and flying altitudes. As with Paradise Wildlife Park a day earlier we took a pen and pad with us and were drawing our favourite planes as we walked around the museum. So I drew the Blackbird and Brandon has drawn a lovely Red Arrow (his favourite).

Bingo and the boys find my Blackbird.

Just a nice picture of some of the amazing planes in hanger 7.

Soldier Joshua reporting for duty, Sir.

Joshua pretending to be a pilot as you look through the cockpit of a fighter plane.

Then Brandon's turn to be a pilot.

The boys have learnt a lot of the plane symbols from Disney Planes and recognise the Jolly Wrenches logo and also the USAF symbol is used by Skipper and all over Skippers hanger. So when they saw this large USAF symbol on the wall they both wanted their picture taken with it. 

Both boys recognised the USAF logo from Disney Planes.

My boys under the Blackbird.

Joshua looking straight down the barrel of two guns on the undercarriage of a bomber.

Look at the size of that propeller in comparison to the boys!

For some time now me and Brandon have been saluting each other as I say good night to him and leave his bedroom usually followed by the words "night night captain". So when he put on this soldier hat he saluted me and said "night night Dad". 

Brandon saluting his captain Dad!

Another character from Disney Planes, this one could be Echo or Bravo.

Out on the airstrip we managed to go on board 2 or 3 of the holiday style jumbo jets on display and the boys enjoyed imagining they were flying off to a hot country somewhere as they waved bye bye to Mum who stayed on the ground to look after Holly. I think we went to Spain, Greece, Lapland and London in one visit to Duxford. Not bad eh!

Inside the cockpit of one of the jumbo jets.

Joshua and Brandon arriving in Spain or Greece and heading for the luggage and passport control.

In one of the hangers we found an arts and crafts activity where the two boys got to make some badges and I made one up for Holly. I have to say that Holly's looked outstanding as I drew her a USAF badge with her name around the logo. Brandon drew grass and mud on his badge and Joshua drew a snowman (so not much to do with planes!!!). 

Designing our hand made badges.

Brandon had some birthday money left over which he took with him to Duxford with the intention of buying a plane. As it happened he found a medium size model red arrow in hanger 7 shop which he bought with his money. So you can imagine how pleased he was when we eventually found a Red Arrow Hawk in one of the hangers. He insisted on having his picture taken with the Red Arrow whilst holding his new toy Red Arrow, and then the picture had to be repeated so that I had all four sides of his plane on camera!!!.

Brandon with his favourite Red Arrow Hawk.

Can you see his new toy plane in the picture yet?

There he is with his new toy Red Arrow.

So with some tired legs we made one more trip around the ship and the jumped back in the car for another hour up to Norfolk. Despite being tired the boys didn't both napping in the car and watched more movies en route. As for Holly, well you may have noticed a complete absence of any pictures of Holly! That's because she slept pretty much the whole time we was there. I think she was awake for maybe 1/2 an hour to an hour for a feed and bum change and during this time I carried her in the harness for a while rather then being stuck in the buggy. But after that she was happy to sleep the rest of the day - clearly planes are not her thing!!!!