We're all going to the zoo, erm , yesterday

Saturday morning saw us back at HLC for Tom's waterbabies class. He did ok, but waterbabies have been a little naughty and have now booked 10 babies on the course. If you could see the size of the pool, you would know why this is a problem. Only 8 babies turned up and there wasn't room to move in the pool, I have no idea how it would work with 10. I feel sorry for the teacher as much as for us. When HLC have the pool open for baby swimming sessions, they have a maximum of 6 adults. Matt has written to complain.

Anyway, Tom had a good time was mostly smiles. After some Hai Hai time with Abi (they are now more or less crawling at the same speed) we then went on our way to Chester to meet up with the Watsons at the zoo. Now we got the journey up completely wrong. Decided to go to a pub about half way for lunch. Tom was just about to fall asleep when we got there, unloaded him and food etc, to find the pub was closed! Then went to a tea room which was about 3 further miles down the road, it was also closed. We stopped at the next pub and were lucky. By this time we were running late, so ordered the easiest thing on the menu and managed to feed Tom quickly and were back on our way within 30 mins. Tom refused to go to sleep after lunch, which meant he didn't have any nap at all. (With hindsight, we should have stopped at Long Lane for lunch)

Got to the zoo dead on 1pm which was good going. Considering we were with a 5 year old, 3 year old and 3 month old, and stopped for a coffee we did actually see quite a bit and we all got to see our favourite animals. Tom stayed awake for the whole thing which was fantastic, and he did manage to focus on some of the animals. In the end he was awake from 9.30 to 4.30 which is the longest ever. He did fall asleep after about 5 minutes once back in the car, and I managed to transfer him from the car to his cot at the Watson's without any protestation.

By now his routine was shot to pieces, so we just ran with what we thought best. So, Tom stayed up and had his dinner with Maggie and Tamsin and then had a bath with them as well which went very well. He then was put in a cot in the box room and that was it until I went to get him at 7am the next morning.

Sunday was a lazy day. We took Tom for a walk in the village to the playground so he could have some fresh air. He enjoyed the swings as usual and was cackling away. We then came back and enjoyed a Mother's Day fry up courtesy of Cameron followed by plum crumble courtesy of me. A strange combination, but it worked well for us.

Matt and Cameron bottled up the cider, before we made our way home. Oh, almost forgot to say, I got a Mother's Day card and a gift (a giraffe puppet - I have a feeling that Tom was craftily shopping for himself!).

When we got home, Matt spent some time with Tom in the lounge whilst I was preparing his food in the kitchen. He used the new puppet to say hello to Tom, Tom responded three times in a row by saying 'ello', could it be a coincidence? I definately heard him. When I came into the room Matt tried again, but Tom would only giggle - is it another case of rolling - he would only do that for his Dad for about 3 weeks before he would let me see him.

Today's pic - me with 3 month old Jenny who I had a number of lovely hugs with. How things change. I didn't go near Maggie or Tamsin when they were babies as I was still very scared of babies then, now I can't get enough of them!