The First Cut

This morning I spent some time with Brandon trying to get him used to gripping/holding items. As you can see from below seemed to manage this ok.

And here is Brandon blowing a few raspberries.

Joshua understands what shoes are now and if you tell him to go and get his shoes on he knows exactly what to do. Occasionally he gets it wrong as he did this morning - he came back wearing one of Mum's shoes!!

The other big news for Joshua is that today he had his first ever hair cut. A lot of people have been commenting on how long his hair was at the back, so we figured its time for the first cut. Joshua was an absolute star in the hair dressers and sat on my lap the entire time. Mummy got to keep his first locks for the little trinket box.

And finally for today here are a few pictures of us with the boys on my sisters bouncy castle. This is the first time Joshua has been on it this year and he was so full of confidence and absolutely loved diving all over it. Hopefully we will be in for a good nights sleep as he must be knackered after today.

Joshua bundling on top of Mummy and Brandon on top of Daddy!

Its All In The Jab

The picture of Joshua below is rather appropriate for today as he has been a naughty boy. I picked him up from nursery today and there has been multiple incidences of biting resulting in him drawing blood a couple of times!!! So locked up in a bunker is probably the safest place for him right now.


So onto Brandon. Well to start with I can report that Brandon was hit with two more jabs than what Ricky Hatton managed to land on Pacman at the weekend. Yes it was that horrible time for the little guy as he had his second lot of jabs today. In his defence he took them very well and after a small cry soon went back to sleep. However I sense we could be in for a tough night as Joshua really suffered with the 2nd lot of jabs. We are keeping an eye on his temperature and the calpol is to hand!!!

Brandon is now sitting up well with a bit of support and holds his head proud. So we introduced him to the high chair this weekend. As you can see from below he did not seem to mind this and it is much better for him as he can now sit at the dinner table with me, Tina and Joshie.


Also here is a little picture taken at the weekend of Brandon with his Grandad - Hummmm, who has the most hair?

Spitfire

Well today has been a really mad, busy, non-stop, full-on day and so I apologise for bombarding you with dozens of new pictures. The second apology is that most of the pictures are of Joshua. I know this is bad and it looks like I am neglecting Brandon, but I assure you I am not and tomorrow will feature more on Brandon.

Anyway the first update is that Joshua has been introduced to another first - the ice lolly.......

So onto today. First off we all headed over to North Weald for the Damn Yankees American Car Show. There was a bit of a tussle at first as to who was driving between me, Tina and Joshua. My how they grow so quick.............Joshua won the battle............

Once we arrived at North Weald it became pretty apparent that Joshua was far more interested in plane spotting than looking at lots of shiny yank tanks. He loved the spitfire at the entrance. In the piccie below you can just about see me and Joshua standing underneath it.

And here's Joshua getting up real close and personal - that wing is almost giving him his much needed first hair cut!

The race is on, place your bets. A spitfire or a running Joshua...................?

Once we dragged him away from the plane he still showed little interest in the cars and was far more interested in playing with the streams of tape marking out the parking lot.

Of course Joshua and Brandon were the stars of the car show. But a very close second place was this 2009 model challenger (the first I have seen in this country). Unfortunately I could not look at it for long as a little person started putting finger prints all over it, so it was time for a sharp exit!!

After the car show we stopped off at Mothercare to use up some vouchers and buy Joshua and Brandon a sand and water pit for the garden (seemed like a good idea!). Also we had to get a little sink stool for Joshua to stand on for washing as he is far too big for his changing mat now. As you can see from these pictures Joshua loved playing with the sand.

Eventually you just know the sand will end up everywhere except in the sand tray. Soon Joshua was scooping it on the floor and then having more fun brushing it around with the dust pan and brush.

This was fine until we then opened the water side up and then all the sand on the floor starts to resemble cement!

The idea of setting up the sand and water pit was to occupy Joshua to free up time for me to build up my new dustbin shed (a desperate attempt to stop the cats tearing into my rubbish bags and spreading them all over the garden). My master plan was foiled though as Joshua found playing with tools and helping dad for more fun that his new toy!

I think Joshua thought he was quids in and had been bought another play house. Needless to say we had some major water works once it was complete and he had to stop playing in it to make way for the rubbish.

During most of this time Brandon was sleeping. Do you like his new t-shirt though which Daddy and Joshie bought him from Tesco's this week. Joshua got a toy car whilst shopping but decided to throw it out of the car window straight under the wheels of an oncoming van whilst we were driving home!

I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles........

Brandon is getting bigger and stronger now and holds his head up very steadily now. We have even started to sit him in his bebe chair (see below) to start getting him used to the sitting position. He seems to like this chair a lot more than Joshua ever did.


As today was such a nice day I decided to take the day off and have an extra long weekend. Whilst playing in the garden with Joshua we both had caps on to protect ourselves from the sun. Joshua decided to borrow my cap and put it on back to front (rapper style!).

Also we have had Joshua chasing bubbles around the garden. Hours of fun............

Brandon also enjoyed the garden with a cleverly adapted pram umbrella to protect him from the sun.

Here is a nice close up shot of the little guy. We are starting to wonder whether the teething has already begun as Brandon seems to be dribbling a lot lately.

After all the fun of today Joshua was shattered and had a couple of power naps in the conservatory. He has also been a little under the weather as he was sick yesterday and then a couple of times today he had an elevated temperature. Calpol to the rescue..........

Arsenal Youth Team

Well today we caught a very rare glimpse of some exceptional talent training at the Arsenal Youth Training Camp. First off in their training sessions was a long warm up run around the track.

After the warm-up it was time to do some stretching out on the field.

With the warm-up and stretching out of the way it was time to get down and dirty on the ball skills.

Its been a while since I included a video on the blog. So here is some sneak video footage of that Arsenal Youth Team training session.

After all that exercise it was time to have a chill out for a while.

After football training we took the boys for a nice walk around Langdon Hills. Joshua was a little star and walked for miles up and down hills. He was a little nervous around some of the dogs over the park. Also we have discovered that Joshua has a remarkable skill for spotting planes!!! He seems to be able to spot the smallest plane on the brink of the earths atmosphere with no trouble at all. Roll on the May Air Show - he should love that.

During all this time Brandon was awake and enjoyed having a good look around the park and keeping guard on Joshua's football.

Joshua even decided to help Mummy out by pushing Brandon in the buggy.

Dad foolishly taught Joshua how to play with sticks - stick and stones............

And then as if that wasn't bad enough - gave him a quick 101 lesson in tree climbing.

After about an hour and a half the little guys legs finally tired and it was time to ride high on Dad's shoulders.

And after all of the days excitement and the fresh air - Brandon was still wide awake once we got home.

Olympic Playpen

Well with two children and Tina on basic maternity pay the credit crunch is taking its toll. So it is unfortunate that Joshua's nursery has been cut down to 3 days a week for now. This gives Tina the difficult task of managing both boys a couple of days a week. So in order to help out a little we invested in this playpen so that she has somewhere safe to put one of the boys whilst attending to the other. As you can see below Joshua seems to enjoy just playing in the playpen. Speaking of nursery, Joshua made Mummy a nice little jewelery box at nursery this week.


Joshua's climbing skills are developing all the time. His latest antics include climbing on the dining room chairs (see below), sliding across the patio table, climbing onto the conservatory window seal, and worst of all, he has found away past our make shift stair gate to get into the loft conversion!!!


Below is a picture of Joshua, Brandon and Mia which Tina took when they all went to SeaLife Centre last week.


Joshua is always very keen to give his little brother cuddles and kisses. Slowly he is learning to be gentle, but he does end up saying sorry a lot!


At the weekend Joshua was playing with his cars and desperately tried to hand one to Brandon. He seemed completely confused as to why Brandon would not take the car and play with him. Still at least he is prepared to share his toys and not sit on them all like my elder sister did with me!


A rare picture of Dad sitting with two tired boys (thumb in the mouth is always a sign Joshua is ready for a nap).

As you can see from above Brandon is getting bigger and bigger. He is now 12 weeks old and has finally topped Joshua's birth weight as he is around 10lb now. Can you believe that Joshua turned a year and half this week!!!