Samuel recognises most of the characters “In the Night Garden” and has his own names for the characters which he shouts out when they’re on the screen.But strangely and perhaps worryingly:
Last night I managed to get him to shout Binky Bonk instead but I’m still curious as to why he felt the need to shout insults at a train.
Sam enjoys the toys
Last week we spent a happy week up North at Center Parcs in the Lake District. We travelled up on the Friday and attended my cousins wedding on the Saturday. Samuel was reasonably quiet during the service except for the last bit where he was allowed to roam into a section of the church with toys… members of the congregation with good ears heard a crash, shortly followed by an “Oh oh” from Sam. At the reception Samuel played with the toys that his Great Aunt had bought for him and was fascinated by the disco where he spent a while doing his signature dance.
Sam relaxing in his trailer
On the Monday we made the 2 hour drive to the Whinfell Forest ‘branch’ of Center Parcs. Samuel brought a healthy supply of minions in the form of Cara, Nick and his Grandparents. Our lodge was reasonably close to the village centre so we didn’t have to use our bikes too much. We enjoyed our last Center Parcs trip but this one was even better as Samuel is walking around and could enjoy things like the little trolleys in the park market. Everything was quite busy as it was half-term but we got the chance to play a bit of badminton and discovered that I’m rubbish at table tennis. Whinfell is a red squirrel conservation zone and we had spotted quite a few of them during our five day stay. It’s the first time I’ve seen the (smaller) red squirrel – they seemed much more bouncy than their grey cousins, jumping about all over the place.
Archery pros
We had a lovely time and I think the minions did too. Me and Jessica got to have a bit of free time, trying out some archery and ensuring that Jessica got her standard strawberry and cream frappuccino. Samuel always develops a huge amount when there are so many people around to pay him attention.When we started the holiday he was saying around 5 different words and now he’s approaching 30 words – the days of everything being a car seem to be behind us 🙂
Recently we borrowed a Wheely Bug from the toy library and it was so good that we had to buy one for Samuel. He loves his new toy and I highly recommend it as an indoor toy for young kids. The website is here.
Sam is a big fan of the Formula 1 and cars in general. His first proper word was “Car!” and for the last month or so everything I point at gets called a car.
There has been a definite lull in my activity on the blog over the last month so I thought I’d give a quick digest of what I’ve been up to.
Samuel with one of his new toys
First of all there was Christmas… we were lucky enough to have my parents to visit this year so Samuel got to spend Christmas day with Grandad and Grandma. Jessica prepared a lovely Christmas dinner and Samuel had a great time with so many people there to entertain him. I have a mountain of chocolate to get through post Christmas and have so far only dented the surface.
This was before I had a drink
For New Years Eve, Cara and Nick took time out of their busy social calendar to spend the last evening of the decade with me and Jessica. As Samuel slept soundly we made some predictions for 2020 and enjoyed a game of Taboo whilst eating Pizza and a hastily assembled cheese board. We pulled the last of the festive crackers and I invented Elton-vision (above).
He enjoyed himself, honestly
On New Years Day we went to Kelsey park where Sam had a go on the swings and I fed the squirrels. The squirrels in the park are really tame and a lot of people bring nuts along to feed them by hand.
Squillie enjoys a cashew
We’re hoping that 2010 will be a quiet year for our family so we can enjoy all Sam’s milestones and have a bit of a rest after our marriage-house-baby stress marathon. Things at work are all change with a move from Kingswood to W12 and a challenging project taking a lot of my time. I hope that you had a great holiday and are looking forward to an exciting year too.
Happy New Year!
When things go quiet in our house you need to start looking to see what Samuel is up to. Whilst Jessica’s back was turned last night Samuel decided to investigate one of the food cupboards and managed to achieve this.
This would make a good advert
We’ve just got back from a nice BBQ at work and wanted to share this clip of Samuel watching Chris and Andrew playing croquet – for some reason it caused him great amusement. We’ve got some pictures that we’ll put up (if they’re any good) soon.
Model dinosaurs
Yesterday we took a trip to Crystal Palace to see a craft market and visit the park. The market was a little disappointing (with about 4 craft stalls) but thankfully we picked a day when there were some “Sell it Mama!” stalls selling second hand baby clothes and toys. We picked up some clothes for Sam and headed off to the park to look at the model dinosaurs.
You can see pictures from the park here.
Jessica found Sam happily trying to doze in his bouncer the other day – notice how he still bounces slightly in his sleep!
A masterpiece
I got back after Sam’s bedtime on Sunday so we celebrated Father’s Day today instead. Samuel had been busy, buying me some of my favourites chocolates along with a mug and something to soothe my aching feet. I was particularly impressed with the card that he’d literally had a hand in. As you can see on the left, Samuel did his first bit of painting especially for me – his Mum added the lettering.
This afternoon I took Sam for his first trip to the swimming pool. Initially he was a bit overwhelmed and sat fairly stationary in the water looking around at the massive unfamiliar bath into which he’d been placed. It didn’t take him long before he was splashing and kicking water just like he does at home. He did really well and spent 20 minutes in the pool before being towelled off and given a bottle. I look forward to taking him swimming again as he seems to really enjoy it.