Maxi’s school was having a parents’ day today so after meeting his teacher this morning we had the rest of the day for fun. Maxi and dad went down to the Royal Academy to see the Anish kapoor exhibition

and the famous wax cannon. Maxi enjoyed it but after 40 minutes decided the place smelled funny and we had to leave. We went for lunch and Max decided to create some art works of his own involving his face and some ice cream. After that to Hamleys to see what a good boy might like for his Birthday and for Christmas…

Maxi's first day at school with Mum and Miri

Maxi’s first day of school

It’s probably the first day that most of us will clearly remember, so with name tags ironed into shirts and shorts we dropped Maxi off for his first day at school, hoping he would enjoy it. As you can probably see from the photos, I’m not sure he was totally convinced by mum and dad’s new plan for the next 13 years. However by the end of the day Maxi had made a couple of new friends, Nicholas, Thomas (who he knew from Buttons) and Alan. So far so good. The past couple of weeks have been notable for his tiredness on returning home. Learning has absolutely whacked him out! It seems to be a shared experience amongst the other parents with night wakings and voracious appetites all par for the course as their brains start wiring up. More to follow…

 All good things come to an end and Maxi finished at Nursery on Friday. He’s more than ready for big school and I’m hoping we’ve done our best to prepare him for the big adventure that is school. The only downside I feel is that by leaving his sister behind she will miss having him around during the day. On the plus side Miri has got her first boyfriend, Woody, who is very protective of her so I’m told! When I dropped her off the other day she was chasing another boy round the car park and laughing. Let’s hope it’s not a glimpse of things to come!

Maxi’s favourite programme at the moment is Kerwhizz, the quiz with added whizz. He’s been so taken with it that he builds his own tracks around the kitchen and has press ganged Melissa, Miri and I into playing along.  We were quite impressed with his latest efforts ‘Bootworld’ but judge for yourselves…..

The Results!

We took a trip up to Northumberland to see Granny Lorna at the start of the year. Mirabelle as you’ll see from the video is now on the verge of walking. The whole process comes in a small set of progressions from

Cilmbing stairs…

To cruising around on her walker…

I’m keeping my eyes peeled and camera at the ready for those elusive first steps…

Well as dad got a new pocket video camera from Santa today it would be rude not to blog our christmas day in video so, hopefully, if I can get the computer to stop crashing I will keep posting lots of little videos on here over the course of the day…

So after an initial frenzpart of present opening, we took Maxi and Miri to the park to run off some steam. Maxi really wanted to take his grabber…

Attack of the Grabber

When Grabbers Go Bad!

Christmas Swingers!

Miri's first shoes, size two and a half!

I’m proud to report that just days after her 9 month birthday, Miri is now cruising around as the video evidence encoded below will testify to. It’s just as well we picked up the cute little numbers at the top of the page to help her cut a dash at the local toddler group! They are size two and a half, the smallest shoes in the shop….

Grandad and his gorgeous granddaughter

Max and Miri had a visit from Grandpa Ron and Granny Val last weekend. They also paid a visit to see Josh, Harriet and Uncle Jake and Auntie Frankie down in Putney. As always Maxi and Miri really enjoyed playing with their cousins and eating Auntie Frankie’s cake!

It's Spooky Wooky Time!

Maxi dressed up as a ghost for Halloween this year and went trick or treating for the first time. He only got 4 houses up the street and proved to be a little too shy to enjoy knocking on strangers’ doors and asking for sweets. We made a tactical retreat, put our pumpkin out and waited for callers. This was much more Maxi’s scene and he enjoyed seeing the pot pouri of evil costumes knocking at our door. He dutifully gave out the sweets we had on hand, although as they supplies quickly depleted he was quick to make sure I kept a couple of packets back for him!

Liss and I had forgotten just what a cascade of events tend to happen around this stage of development. On her 7 month birthday,  Mirabelle is now crawling. Gone are the halcyon days of putting her down, getting a cup of tea and coming back to find her in the same place. Time to get the hawkeyes back out of the cupboard…