Off we go

When I wrote my pledge I said I wouldn't leave you for more than three days without a post. I forgot about holidays. Maybe I will find somewhere with internet access, maybe I won't. Maybe if I do, I'll be too busy making sandcastles anyway. So it's bye for now. And little man says 'bebabebabeba tea!'

Time for the last-minute packing...

Packing

I packed little man's suitcase for a week away this morning. He unpacked it because he wanted to put monkey and Timmy the Tiger (small but fierce) in the suitcase. I piled up my clothes on my bed, ready to pack; little man distributed them around the room. I tried to pack some food; little man demanded the raisins and breadsticks ('tick, tick'). I tried to get him to doze off in front of the TV - well it's only once in a while! He was almost there then he sprang up again. We had to go out in the car to get him to sleep. While he was parked on the drive I got some packing done. After he woke up, I got him out of the car and gave him a cuddle. He fell asleep snuggled up on me for another three quarters of an hour. A very cosy reminder of when he was tiny, but it didn't help to Get Things Done.

After lunch I threw him out the back door to play with the chickens (who are all looking in a very sorry state due to moulting). Well, actually I just put his shoes on and opened the door, knowing he would immediately go outside. I got some more packing done.

Then the cavalry arrived. Grandma and grandad, all ready to take little man for a walk to the shop so I could empty all the junk out of my car, get a large pan of bolognese sauce on the go and engage brain to think of all the things I would need to take for a week in a cottage in south-west Scotland.

I try to include little man in the things that have to be done in what constitutes everyday life for us. And I understand that this means things will get done more slowly and not always at the time I planned to do them. But sometimes it's nice to have someone else to play with him when there are things that really have to be done on a certain day.

Little man's status updates

Little man:

• had a strop because his fake eggs kept falling out of their fake box as he slammed his fake shopping trollery around.
• had a strop because mummy wouldn't let him drop a fake egg in a real cup of milk.
• had a dance.
• ran away at the first sight of trousers, as usual.
• tried to stamp on all the piles of cornflakes as mummy swept them up.
• flirted his way to extra biscuits at Tiny Talk. Again.
• is pleased that mummy bought a melon at the supermarket but wanted to eat it right there and then.
• appeared in the garden with a large handful of oatcakes apparently intent on feeding them to the chickens.
• fed the chickens a spare courgette.
• said 'no' quite clearly for the first time ever when mummy suggested he might like to finish his oatcake instead of demanding breadsticks.
• said 'stick', meaning breadstick.
• stirred a pot of four-day old tea.
• emptied all the dirty clothes out of the washing basket so he could climb into it instead.
• ate the end piece of the garlic clove mummy was chopping.
• grated some Parmesan.
• didn't notice when mummy skipped several pages of his bedtime books. Cackle.

It's a boy!

Well, actually at first it's really just a baby. Not much difference apart from the tendency for boys to wee in your face as soon as you remove their nappy. STBE husband and I had thought of him as a her. Only because all family and friends who have had babies in the past few years have had girls. We decided to find out the sex at the anomaly scan and were a bit stunned to be told it was a boy. Not disappointed. Just surprised.

He is now developing behaviours that could be described as 'boyish': an inability to pass a stick without picking it up and whacking something with it, a need to be physically on the move, a love of splashing in puddles. Then again, he loves a big hug, cuddles his fluffy toys, enjoys looking at books and gives kisses out freely. He's both adventurous and affectionate, boisterous and cuddly.

But I am starting to ponder how you go about bringing up a boy so he can carry on being all of those things. Not the type of teenage lad you see walking down the street at school hometime who oozes surliness and aggression. How do you bring up a boy to be a decent sort of person? One who can be strong and confident, but caring and thoughtful too. How do you steer a boy through childhood so he doesn't become one of the mini thugs... but also so he doesn't get picked on by them?

Artless child

It is little man's daddy's birthday on Wednesday. I have been trying to get little man to do some artwork to make into a card. With little success.

This is the result from the finger paints, and only after I dragged his hand around to make the prints. I tried chalk, but he decided to walk off into the garden with it. I tried crayons but he tried to eat them and showed much more interest in taking them out of the box then putting them back in the box. He's really not yet into art. He doesn't like to sit still for that long and I don't think it has occurred to him that he can create an image of something familiar on paper.

I think I'll have another try before bathtime with the paints when the mess will be easy to clean up. He is now trying to bash the keyboard. It's a shame I can't make an artwork out of his bashing, although I have just discovered babysmash thanks to FLP. Lets little one bang on the keyboard without breaking the computer.

Five things...

...that I like about autumn:
1. The colours, obviously.
2. The contrast between warm days and cool nights.
3. Misty mornings and dew on spiders' webs.
4. Fat, juicy blackberries.
5. The drawing-in-ness of it all.

Obsession

My latest knitting project. Never mind that I should be knitting a gift for allgrownup's new baba, or that there are still three months to go before I'll be putting my tree up. These lovely mini stockings will be adorning my tree, hopefully in my new home. I used what yarn I had, which is why the green is minty rather than forest. Acknowledgements go to http://littlecottonrabbits.typepad.co.uk/free_knitting_patterns/ for the pattern. I'm planning some little gold bells on the back of them. Right now I'm considering knitting a couple more, I think twelve would be a good number, even though I'm supposed to be sorting out my paperwork and packing boxes.