Oh pickles!

Makayla's new favourite word is 'Oh Pickles', which sounds so cute when she comes out with it! It's much better than some of the things she could imitate ;-)
She spent a day with Auntie Margaret the other day, and when we dropped her off kept saying goodbye so that we would hurry up and go! She had a fabulous day, feeding the chickens and emptying the goldfish pond, going out to the Black Beagle for a lunch of chips and marshmallows, and playing with a spinning top with Ashley. She was a bit of a nightmare when we left tho, not wanting to say thank you and good bye to Auntie Margaret, which she's normally so good at. But she was certainly one tired girl.

Boys will be boys...and Jesse is definitely a boy!

When unpacking a load from the car into the shack yesterday the kids were running around outside. After playing in the puddles for a bit Jesse made straight for the paddling pool which was laying on an angle, and of course had a couple of inches of water from the rain in it. Well, he had an awesome time, jumping, filling his gumboots, and of course over balancing and falling straight in the water. I didn't worry, he was having such a great time.
However it was a different story when we tried to call him inside! He took off towards the sheep paddock to talk to Auntie Maree's new sheep (who thinks it's a dog) who is really friendly. Not content with that however, he decided to fall face first into the pile of dirt Dowah and Grandad had recently delivered for the garden. Head to toe in lovely black dirt.
He's actually really heavy when you have to carry him from the shack to the house while trying to keep his wet, dirty body away from mine, and him squirming to go back to the dirt. Luckily Dowah was here to help, and we put his little cold, red body straight into the bath.

Speech day

Off to speech therapy for Makayla today. This is the third of four weeks, and she is still having problems with the 'k' sound. She can say car fine, but coin is toin, can is tan etc. We'll keep working on it.
Jesse has a mysterious new bump on his forhead. Not sure how he accumulated that one. This morning he pointed at Makayla, then tapped his head, then clapped to let me know he wanted the hat Makayla was wearing. Not much speech, but his communication is great.

Learning times

I can't believe within one day Makayla has figured out how to play a game on the computer. From never before using the computer, to actually playing the game in just 24 hours. Dowah showed her how to play it yesterday, it's s simple childs game where they have to recognise the different parts of the cake to build it, from the shape, to the colour of the cake and icing, and the decoration. They probably spent half an hour learning it. And today Mikki is happily playing it, and completing it successfully.

Jesse is now saying 'Kaya' for Makayla, and has the 'come' hand motion down pat. He's still tantruming, throwing himself on the floor when he doesn't get his way, but I think he's starting to figure out it doesn't work, it's not happening as often.

I looked at some of the other kids at play centre the other day, and we really are lucky. Our kids are so well behaved, and play together so well, they really are best friends. I see other kids tantruming, and it's so much worse than Jesse. I see other kids push their younger siblings out of the way to get to what they are playing with, whereas Makayla will sit next to Jesse and play with him. Don't get me wrong, we have our moments, and at the moment they seem to enjoy pushing Mum to see how far I can go. But that's life. I just gotta deal with it.

Why? Why? Why?

Time to go to bed Makayla. Why?
Let's go to the Rugby Club. Why?
Put your shoes on. Why?
Hop in the car. Why?
Up to the table for breakfast. Why?

Oh this is such a fun stage. I can't believe how often she says 'why?', and even if I explain something she will still say why. I know 'Because Mummy said so' is a bad answer, but somethimes it's all that will come out!

Naughty Wasp!

Poor Makayla, she was playing on the chair tonight and managed to get stung by a wasp, that was pretty much dead anyway. Poor thing, she screamed and screamed. I was torn between hugging her, trating her, and getting rid of the wasp before Jesse got to it. So I screamed for Keith and just held her. It's such an awful feeling when your child is hurt, and all I wanted to do was take away the pain. We put vinegar on it, then she sat with an ice pack on it for ages, curled up in front of TV. Amazingly the pain seemd to fade after an hour or so, and she went off to bed at 7.30, and was asleep by 8. Touch wood she's still in there, but I don't think she'll last the night in there. She's been coming in to our bed most mornings, anywhere between 1.30 (too early, she gets put back to her own bed), and usually 5.30-6.30.
Jesse doesn't miss out, he's also been in the wars. He decided to go head first down three concrete steps at daycare the other day, and has a massive bruise on his forehead with some grazes going down his nose. Erana said he cried lots, but was ok after that. When she texted me about it I just said cool, that'll match the other two bumps on his head he's had the last few days, but when I picked him up it was a bit worse than I realised! But he's a strong little trooper, and is not at all worried about it. The tests have come back for Jesse, and he doesn't have haemophilia, which Keith and I were pretty sure of anyway, for the amount he bumps himself if he was he'd be covered in bruises. When Makayla was crying on me Jesse come up beside her and gave her a big cuddle, it was so cute. And it was gorgeous when Makayla told the wasp off and told it it was naughty!

Wall art!

Oh dear. Makayla seems to have decided her walls aren't decorative enough, and that she needed to add some art to her bedroom walls! Thank goodness she used some purple chalk, so it was hard to be too angry at her, but I had to pretend to be to get the point across it is naughty to draw on walls. Unfortunately I didn't catch Jesse drawing on the doors with pen, and that doesn't come off so easily!

Makayla was talking to Dowah this morning on the phone (as she always has to do), and it was really lovely to hear her ask Dowah if her back was better. She's very thoughtful.

Jesse's language is coming along well, with a real litany of grunts and finger pointing. I'm still not fully proficient at his language, but can generally understand him by the time he gets to the screams.

I shot a video of Makayla singing and dancing to The Wiggles this morning. She looked so cute, and she really does love dancing, singing, and especially The Wiggles. I'll attempt to upload it...but I can't promise anything!!!