A fantastic day with my Guardian Daddy

Another week has gone in a flash and Spain now feels like it was an age ago. However, Tom has been a delight - well behaved, fun, walking without protest and eating well (on some days anyway).

We went to Hoo Farm twice this week (open all week as it is half term) ,he walked most of the way round, no sit down protests, no eating stones - we may have turned a corner.

He had a good time at nursery, he's back in his old room again and happy about it. Chris (his Key Worker) started getting all reflective on me. Tom was his first charge so quite attached to him - he was saying that Tom will be gone before he knows it - apparently they go up to the next room a month before their 2nd birthday, so he only has 2 months left. How did that happen, suddenly he has gone from one of the youngest to one of the oldest. I will be really sorry for him to leave his room - all the staff are brilliant - very happy and chatty and Chris makes me laugh so much (although I'm not sure he knows it!).

I only had one cake to do this week - but it was lots of fun, a Halloween Cake for a boyfriend who has his birthday on Halloween. Really enjoyed making the various decorations, the bats on springs were quite challenging, but got there in the end and the client seemed happy.

Spent most of Thursday baby sitting - looked after Hannah and Becca at 53 for the morning, had the afternoon 'off' and then baby sat for Oliver for the night for Rachel and Errol (had a very useful evening, deleting over 1GB of redundant and duplicate files from the computer)

Saturday Tom and I were on our own for most of the day (hence the second visit to Hoo Farm), but today we drove to Gloucester to meet with Martin. Vanessa and the kids are already in Oz, Martin is flying out at the beginning of December so we demanded we saw him before he left. We had a lovely time, luckily Mum and Dad had visited earlier this year and said that the dock area was worth a visit, so we hunted it out. Found a good outlet centre (I bought some new cutters for my cakes - you can never have enough), had lunch at Pizza Express (Tom behaved impeccably and seemed to take a shine to everything Matt ordered including the chicken on his pizza - he refuses to eat meat at home, so Matt ended up with a vegetarian pizza!) We then walked round the dock area and visited the cathedral (very nice - very big, lovely cloisters and lots of strange sculptures). Had a really good day, we are very sad to say goodbye to Martin, but looking forward to seeing him next in Oz. If you are reading this Martin - keep in touch - we will be expecting lots of skype calls and Facebook updates.

As you can see, Tom enjoyed spending the day with his Guardian parent. We think he is lucky to have such a wonderful person to visit in Australia.

A busy weekend

After getting back from Spain very late on Thursday night (actually Friday morning to be accurate), we had a busy weekend as it was Sammie's wedding on Saturday, which was held in a village near Boston in Lincolnshire. So it was a case of dump everything, change bags and shoot out the door again.

Anyway, the wedding went well, Tom behaved impeccably and the cake made it more or less in one piece - the middle tier was cracked, but I took a comprehensive cake repair kit with me, and by the time I finished, you could hardly see it was there, so I think I got away with it. Lots of lessons to learn for next time.

We stopped off at Belton Park on the way home (where Pride and Prejudice was filmed), where there was an adventure playground and maze. The playground was ok, but the maze was the best thing ever - he ran and giggled his way round like a complete loony.

Got home ok, in fact the journey there and back was remarkably good.

Today we were back to normal, so it was Messy Mondays this morning - AT LAST I got him to do some painting, so we have a orange splattered cardboard plate with some black triangles on it hanging proudly on a kitchen cupboard (it is supposed to be a Halloween pumpkin). This afternoon we went to Hoo Farm - it was a glorious afternoon, blue skies, but freezing cold, so I took the opportunity to dress him up in the winter suit we bought for £2 in Japan. Doesn't he look cute.

That's about it, as we are back to normal we are back to playing with food, I give him things which he initially refuses, so he goes to bed hungry, I give it to him again the following day etc etc, until hunger takes over, he tries it and realises he does actually like it. It worked with sandwiches, so lets hope it works with other things. This week I am going to try to get him to eat egg mayonnaise sandwiches, I'll report back if I win...

A fantastic holiday

Think we are 2 weeks behind now, so this is a quick resume. Granma and Pop Pop came up 2 Sunday's ago for a couple of days and had a good time with Tom, he didn't tire them out as much as normal as he went to nursery as usual, giving them a break from entertaining. Anyway everyone had a good time and Tom was able to point to Granma and Pop Pop individually on request - so he definitely knows who they are which is fab.

Thursday saw us off to San Jose for what has become our regular October holiday - maybe our last as Debi is selling it now she's had the twins (boo hoo!). We had a fantastic time, Tom was on good form, and unlike last year, he slept! In fact he slept more in two nights this holiday than he did during the whole holiday last year. We kept him on English time, whilst we moved to Spanish time, meaning he was up later (a good thing as everything closes down between 2 and 5 for siesta), but better than that, it meant he didn't get up until 8 / 8.30am, meaning we had a lie in every morning - pure bliss!

He liked the sun as before, and was a lot more fun to play with than last year. He spent 3 days on the beach, took a while to get him warmed up, but he enjoyed playing in the sand, filling his bucket with sand, throwing it around and eating it (of course). It was a little harder to get him into the sea, he was ok if we were holding him and his feet were dangling in it, but he didn't like standing up in it, even if he was holding onto both of us. He did, however, like drinking it - kept dangling his hand in the waves and then sucking it - yuck!

He reconquered the Alcazaba in Almeria, was fascinated by the horses and cowboys at Mini Hollywood, and was very good during a walk we did up some mountains behind San Jose.

He absolutely loved the apartment, running round and round, and playing with all Charlie's toys. It was very novel for him to have a whole house on one floor and he took full advantage of it.

Of course he also had the full attention of his father, which went down really well, the played and played and played all holiday together, was really nice for me to take a back seat and watch them both having so much fun with each other.

Oh yes, the word of the holiday was 'Daddy-ya', not sure what it means yet, maybe it will morph into something understandable soon.

Anyway, we all relaxed, slowed down and enjoyed life for the week. It will be a real shame if we don't go back.

A good weekend

Whoops, got behind again!

We had a nice weekend. Saturday morning Tom had his swimming lesson, then we drove to Shrewsbury to do a spot of shopping, Lakeland had a 3 for 2 offer with their bakeware tins including large ones (10 inch and 12 inch) so I took advantage of it. We went for lunch in a pub where Tom was extremely well behaved, eating all his lunch and some of ours as well. We then decided to pop into our favourite furniture shop for a little look around and to see if they had anything we could use as a cake cupboard. £400 later we left the shop! It's arriving today - can't wait, at the moment I have to keep moving the cakes around the house depending on where Jodie or Tom are so they can't destroy them. This will make it a lot easier.

I spent the evening out with the girls from BEST in a bowling alley - Sammie's sort of hen night. Was really nice, first time we've met and been without children, meaning that we could have a conversation without looking out for babies, being interrupted etc. Think we must have had the longest game ever, took us 4 hours to play 3 games with only 4 on each team, ended up having to eat there as all the nearby restaurants had closed by the time we finished. Only just got home before midnight.

Sunday we headed in to Telford for a quick spot of shopping, then Greg's to pick up some lunch and then to the Maxell Gardens for a picnic, they are really pretty at the moment as all the trees are turning red. Tom was on good form and had a good kick around.

Mum and Dad arrived when Tom was still asleep, so he was all shy when he saw them, didn't take long for him to warm up and within half an hour he was gadding around the garden with them, he didn't stop running here and there and generally having a really good time.

Monday Mum and Dad took Tom out to Attingham Park for the day where he wore them out and behaved very well. I used the time to put together my first ever wedding cake - very scary, hope she likes it. Tom came home zonked. He had a snooze and then we had a play whilst Mum and Dad recovered. Matt and I went out for dinner - nice pub in Newport that is under new management and has been completely refitted out. Then home and bed. Tom must have been very worn out, I had to wake him at 7.45 this morning so I could take him to nursery!

Tom is a tyke!

Tom slept through on Sunday night (maybe he really didn't need his dinner). Since then he has eaten very well, so maybe I wasn't being overly mean.

The weather this week has been glorious, so we have taken full advantage of it and spent as much time outside as possible. Tom has enjoyed exploring the autumn landscape, picking up leaves and giving them to me.

On Wednesday I went to collect Tom from nursery and Chris gave me the finger painting you can see opposite. I told him about how I can't get Tom to do anything messy, he was really surprised. Apparently his portfolio is full of paintings that Tom has done for him. He went on to tell me how much he loves playing with anything mucky - play doh, gloop, glue etc, he will go over and play with it even if it's not his planned activity. The little tyke! How come he will do it for Chris and not me?! I get tears if I try to do anything like that, I will keep trying.

Wednesday evening I got the news that Michelle's Mum had died (Seren's Grandmother). I got quite teary, made me think - Seren won't remember her which will be really hard for Michelle. Michelle is an only child and not yet 30, so it must be hitting her really hard. So sad, she wasn't old, just unlucky - she had cancer a couple of years ago, I'm guessing it came back. I have offered my help to Michelle, but she is the type of person to not take it.

I haven't done any cakes recently, I haven't taken on any orders in the attempt to get Sammie's wedding cake done. All the tiers are now marzipanned and iced, figures more or less completed - just need to do the eyes, and put the military decorations on Will. Spent all this week making roses for it, next challenge is to put it all together - am a bit scared, but I will need to do it soon, Mum and Dad are coming up on Sunday and their room is currently full of iced cakes.

Muddy puddles

A nice weekend. Saturday was gorgeous weather wise, Matt was still feeling yuck so Tom and I went swimming on our own. He was really good again, only crying when he startled himself, trying to throw a ball into the ball (instead of throwing a ball he threw himself, but only halfway - I caught him, but he got a little upset. Didn't last long)

As it was such a lovely day, when we got home, I ordered Matt outside, so we went to Norbury Junction - where there is a canal and path to walk along. I carried Tom as he was sleepy and not wanting to walk and Matt was having trouble walking himself. Went to the tea room for lunch, sandwiches and a bowl of chips. Tom ate chips and refused anything else. Typical!!!! Other than that he was well behaved. The tea room didn't have any high chairs, I thought I would give Tom the benefit of the doubt and try him in an adult chair to see if he would sit still and not try to climb out. He did us proud, he still wriggled, twisted round to watch the narrow boats pass by (who can blame him), but apart from that was very well behaved. I guess he is growing up...

After lunch we went over to feed the ducks (for the first time ever, I had remembered to bring some old bread out with us) The ducks were excited and came up to see us. Matt and I showed Tom what to do: tear the bread, throw to the ducks. I gave Tom some bread, it went straight into his mouth! We tried again and again, but he decided that the ducks would go hungry as he stuffed the bread into his mouth. Apparently then stale bread is better than sandwiches made with fresh bread and fillings!

There were a lot of muddy puddles on the path by the ducks which Tom decided to explore. Which was fun, until he went SPLAT, face first into a puddle! He got soaked, poor thing. Luckily I had something on me he could change into so he wasn't wet for long. We then went to speak to a lady running a cheese shop on her narrow boat (what a great way to spend your days). She had lots of samples for us to try - this cheered Tom up no end, he ate the lot, and we ended up spending £10 on cheese, including one very fiery Red Leicester.

We returned home after that, Tom had his sleep and I finished off Paul's cake just in time for his birthday party which we went to once Tom was up. We all had a good time, especially Tom who
got to eat lots of very naughty food: basically sugar, salt and fat, not a piece of vegetable or fruit passed his lips naughty boy - just goes to show if you allow them choice, they do go for the bad things.

Came home just before 7, for a quick bath and bed. I was absolutely exhausted as was Matt so we both collapsed on the sofa until 9.30 when we gave up and went to bed.

We ALL had a fab night's sleep. The radio woke me up at 7, took me a while to come too, around 7.30 I went in to get Tom - he was still asleep (the effect of two late nights), he stayed asleep until 7.50 - a record. Today was very very miserable, it rained for most of the day. We escaped the house to visit Focus for some bits for the house and Waitrose for some luxury food items and lunch. Then home, sleep for Tom, catch up on various things for me. Jude and Richard then came round for tea and delivered some goodies from Pat and Bob who had just returned from the USA - yummy jamabalaya mix for us and some T-shirts and a book for Tom - many thanks. Tom then refused his dinner (risotto), so he didn't get any pudding and is going to bed hungry (am I being overly mean?)

That's it for this weekend - except to say that Tom is now saying yes (he's been saying yeah for a while, but this weekend the s has crept in). He also now shakes his head in order to say no (ie no vegetables, no risotto etc etc)

Curry disaster

I was looking forward to today. We had arranged to meet up with one of Tom's little friends and her Mum and Dad for curry at the East End Balti. We had told them about our success when we took Tom a couple of weeks ago, Pat, Daisy's Dad loves curry so we arranged it.

Unfortunately Matt is still quite under the weather, with little appetite so he decided to stay at home (it must be serious!) we went along, and I now wish we had cancelled on account of Matt (problem is that Pat is seldom at home through work). I think I walked into a family row. Olivia (Daisy's half sister who is about 10/11) had bright red eyes and had obviously been crying. Pat was miserable, leaving Jane to try to make conversation. Then Daisy decided to kick off and started to scream - huge loud, ear piercing screams. You could cut the atmosphere with a knife. I tried to make conversation, but just got monosyllabic answers. Pat walked out with Daisy and then sent Olivia in to hasten Jane up. I was left on my own with Tom - it was a complete nightmare. One of the worse meals out I have ever had.

On the plus side, Tom was an absolute angel - ate loads of poppadom and then loads of rice and curry sauce - didn't murmur a word. Came home needing a stiff drink! Remind me not to do that again!

We are seeing them tomorrow as Tom and Daisy go swimming together, I wonder how it will go...