May 2017 - Part 1

May 2017 – Part 1

There’s not been a blog from me in “for ages” so time to write a quick one whilst Francis is sleeping. Most of my recent spare time was employed in painting a friend’s house but now that is mostly finished and winter is here we’re back to relaxing times at home. That’s if you call preparing for an overseas trip with an eighteen month old and moving house two days after you get back relaxing.

Eye Love You

Francis is growing up real fast and is leaving his “baby ways” behind. One of the saddest ones is he no longer likes to be held in my arms as he is going to sleep. He either just lies flat across my legs with his head on the arm of the chair or points to his cot and asks to be put in it.  

So much to my (initial) delight, he wanted some snuggles the other day at nap time. As he settled into my arms I told him “I love you, Francis” and was rewarded with a big, wide open smile from him that melted my heart momentarily. He then proceeded to sit up straight, still smiling and poked me in the eye. Yep, he’s getting good at pointing out body parts…..

Feng Shui and the Art of House Buying

After two years of trying to buy a house and putting in bids on eight of them, we expressed our dismay on Facebook. Our dear sister-in-law, Nellie, sent us a Feng Shui guide to houses and we noticed that the “abundance” corner on our rental was missing i.e. it’s the deck. We followed some suggestions to improve that corner and installed  a bird feeder, which the birds managed to empty in less that four hours!

Despite my annoyance at the amount of bird shit on my passion fruit  it seemed to do the trick as a week later we managed to outbid everyone at an auction for a house we really loved! Yipee, and thanks Nellie.

On a side note there was one red seed the birds left on the ground and it’s sprouting everywhere.

Ticking Time Bomb?

Sleep is still a very precious and hugely sought after commodity in our house. In general Francis is only waking up once or twice a night, but then every now and then we get the 5-6 times which utterly exhausts us all. Well, Ananda and I. When will this end?

In a miracle, one night in April  Francis slept all night. We woke stunned. We’ve since tried to re-create the conditions for this to happen but have tied ourselves in knots arguing about the magic formulae.

Ananda claimed it was because his nursery clock battery had stopped so it was not ticking. I steadfastly maintained the clock was in full working order when the miracle occurred, and claimed it was because I accidentally switched up the thermostat to 23degC that night.

Against my protests the clock was removed from the room, but gloatingly after a few nights of poor sleeping it was re-installed. (And by few I probably mean about two weeks – Ananda can be as stubborn as me!)

Finally, victory was mine after a night of 6 wake-ups, the clock was reinstalled. It’s stupid to gloat over a night of no-sleep huh? But such is our lives and the small victories we must take in our battles as parents. I digress….

Similarly disappointing was our, sorry mine,  thermostat experiment of keeping the room at 23degC.  Maybe it was the sleep suit he was wearing or what he ate for dinner, or was I wearing my lucky underpants that night? Was Ananda?

Maybe we’re grasping at straws. Actually, delete the “maybe”.

The quest continues, and we’ve given up this week because on Sunday we fly to the UK for three weeks…… so with the prospect of an eleven hour time change there really is no point in finding the magic combination until we get back.

 Building

Construction seems to be in his blood so here's some examples of what he's been up to....

Reciprocal Trojan Horse

Byker Wall

The Original Byker Wall

I got him some Health and Safety Gear - Just in Case!

Word Up!

Some more words from the Francis’ lexxikon:

Cheese –  one of his favourite meals - and yes I choose that word over food.

Mama –

Dada –

Go – starting to join in with "Ready, steady, go!"

Baby Sign language –

Sorry  - Stroking your forearm in a downwards motion - we use this when he pokes the dogs in the eyes

Water - Three fingers held to your chin - Francis' version is his hand being shoved in his gob but we get his meaning

Tale of the Tape:

$4165 - The price per square metre of our new home

35 - The street number

18078 - km we will travel on Sunday from Hamilton to Newcastle-upon-Tyne