Hello Daddy :-)

Curtis has not seen his daddy since Monday and says he's been missing him very much. Can't wait to see you tomorrow Daddy x x x x

Mummy....PICK ME UP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Like most young toddlers, Curtis has been going through a spell of clinginess. This is the view that Steph sees of Curtis much of the time these days.....

Where's Taid??

As any of our regular or Welsh blog readers will know...Taid [same pronunciation as the word tied] is Welsh for grandad and is the name we use for Gareths dad John in recognition of the Welsh roots on this side of the family. This Easter, as Curtis has been getting very good at identifying people by name we naturaly began to ask him 'Where's nanna?', Where's Tim' etc to see him eagerily point in the correct direction and then give himself a round of applause. He set us all about laughing however when for every time we asked him 'Where's Taid?' he began rubbing his eyes and looking sleepy!

Splashback!

The week b4 we came over to Northern Ireland Curtis had for 3 nights refused to go into the bath. Books and online references suggested this was a normal phase at his age as he begins to assert his new found independence. He was however, becoming a little sticky and grubby so we were pleased to find that this week he fell back in love with bathtime....minus the blue seat we used to sit him in. Bath time is no longer a seated activitity, its a fun filled, standing, sitting, walking about, dancing and crawling about extravaganza - with of course...lots of splashing!

Castle Espie Wetland Trust

This week Curtis has been refusing to eat anything from a spoon or eat food that is chosen for him. Offered a raspberry, he'll reach out and get a breadstick for himself, offered a piece of carrot he'll refuse it and point at a chip, offered a piece of toast, he'll find himself some raisins. Healthy home cooked foods are out the window again this week in favour of his 2 new favourite snacks - chips and prawn crackers!! So much for the healthy organic only diet we'd intended for him. Sure it's just another wee phases that will pass.

Worried that he hadn't eaten a whole meal in a while we recruited his cousin Dylan in to help and made them both a picnic of tuna sandwiches, burgers, fruit and cheese hoping that Curtis would copy Dylan when they ate. Some fun was had crawling about in the picnic tent but Curtis didnt play along when it came to eating. Oh well, it was a lovely sunny day however so we decided to pop down to a nearby Waterfowl Trust centre Castle Espie to feed the ducks. What a fantastic centre; baby ducks, a multitude of coloured ducks, geese and swans, woodland walks, playgrounds, bird watching look outs and a coffee shop with delicioius cake.

Sunday drive with Biggles

These past 2 mornings Taid and Curtis have been making the most of the good weather; driving off to the duck pond for their morning walk with Molly, with the roof down. Curtis waves like a lord to passers by as they pose along the streets of Newtonards, and with Curtis's new found love of wearing goggles it's not problem if the wind picks up as Taid lends him his old flying goggles. Chocks away! To further nuture this interest in flying attire, Taid bought Curtis a biggles style bear, who also wears goggles as well as full flying leathers. Hmmmm...where could this all be leading? A trip to the airfield perhaps!!

Down on the Farm

Yesterday Curtis had a lovely day out with his Nanna, Auntie Sandra, Auntie Doris and his 2 cousins Dylan and Josh when they went to visit Streamvale Open Dairy farm in County Down. Curtis is a huge fan of farm animals with his favourite DVD being Baby Einsteins Old Macdonald, and he is slowly mastering some animals sounds too with moo moos here, a woof woof there and anytime he sees a fish it's a blob-a-lob-a-lob-a-lob here and there. So, he was very excited to be seeing lots of animals for real anad spending time with his family in Ireland.

Mummy stayed at home and got some work done during the day and got to see some video clips of the days events when everyone came home. Thanks so much to Sandra for taking those....if we can manage to download some we'll add some on here.

The open dairy farm sounded like it was very well set up, with lots of space to accommodate the Easter week crowds and lots of hands on activities for everyone. Curtis was a little scared of the bigger animals and stayed close to Nanna, but was brave enough to stroke one of the baby chicks and took a real shine to the bunnies, even showing off his signing by indictaing bunny ears with his fingers when he saw them. Curtis watched Dylan and Josh giving milk to the lambs and decided at this point he wanted a bottle of his own! His highlight of the day however was sitting on Nannas knee as they went for a ride on the farm train. Whilst most other kids rebelled at wearing safety goggles for the journey, he happily wore his and enjoyed the ride so much he boo-hooed when they had to get off. After seeing cows, sows, bunnies, lambs, chicks, puppies, hens, ducks and cockerels, goats, reindeer, ponies, deer, mice and fish it was time to head home.

Photos from the farms website:-http://www.streamvale.com/thingsToSee.html

Belated thank yous!

Curtis received money from several people for his birthday and/or Christmas and I'm very sorry that it's taken me this long to report back to those people to say what we bought him and to provide some photographs! As you know we've been busy getting our flat all tidied up ready to sell as we make our plans to move to Dunfermline this summer.

Auntie Doris in Ireland sent Curtis a cheque for his birthday and I tried to buy something in keeping with her own interests, so a big thank you to Doris as Curtis now has his very first art box filled with chunky crayons, chubby hand held coloured markers in the shapes of dog, frog and rabbit which he loves, lots of scribbling and painting paper, some mini canvases for his 1st works of art, a big shower curtain to put on the floor when the young master is at work, some paints and some fantastic mini paint rollers for him to use. Watch this space for Curtis and his abstract paintings coming soon!! Thanks Doris x

Auntie Eunice and Uncle Jim in Ireland also gave Curtis some money and with this we bought Curtis a great set of rescue vehicles from the early learning centre; an ambulance, a fire truck and a police car all with appropriate siren sounds which he loves to copy. We also bought Curtis a picture for his room. It looks like a Japanese classic - but look closely, it has a modern, furry twist! Thank you Eunice and Jim, it's very much appreciated. x

Curti's childminder Tracey also gave Curtis some money for his birthday and we added this to some that Nanna and Taid had left for him one weekend to buy him his very first trike. And what a great trike it is too, already tried and tested by his little pal Milli, this trike has a parent handle so we can steer him about until his big and skillful enough to reach the pedals. Thanks to Tracey, Nanna and Taid x

Nanny Ronny and Grandad Stevo also sent Curtis a cheque for his birthday and we used this to get Curtis some toys for the garden...he now has a little tent, a tunnel for crawling through and a fire truck ride on which he loves scooting about on (even if he can only go backwards!). We also bought him Elvis No.1 Hits Cd which he loves. I must get a video of his face when we play it...Hard Headed Woman being one of hsi favourite tracks! I think cos it's one of the fastest ones. So, thanks also to Grandad Stevo and Nanny Ronny and apologies to all for being so slow in posting this message.

Helping Taid wash the car