Category: week in review

The kids spent a lot of time this week waiting, which they did – by all reports – very well. Here they are at the RTA (the second trip that day, as they looked for one that could help).

In the spirit of contrast, the kids were also able to spend a lot of time running around: here they are holding hands at the duck park. It was a fun trip for them – a place they enjoy spending time, and that only costs us the price of some bread.

Friday was swimming lessons day; when they realised they started practicing swimming on Puff’s bed, actually doing laps (they have yet to master tumble-turns). 

Grandragon was watching Octonauts with them one morning. Everyone was worried that the underwater explorers were in danger, but it all worked out in the end.

Saturday morning Puff was drawing lots of ducklings in chalk, and giving advice on how to draw them to Dad, Huff, anyone who would listen, really.

Saturday afternoon we went to the dog show at Erskine Park to see some relatives and their dogs, and to have a look around. It was a great surprise to find that the kids were eligible to be in a practice “junior handler” demonstration, where they had to ‘show’ the toy dogs (little inflatable dogs on wheels). They did well enough that they won toy dogs, and Huff even won a little trophy for being the youngest. This new, Clifford dog has been added to the menagerie of night-time soft toys in her cot. Puff’s dog, named “Schnitzel von Crumm” was already pretending to be a different dog by church time the next day.

We visited Grandma and Doc on Sunday after Dad and Puff went for a walk for a couple of suburbs. He was pretty happy that we could catch up on some chats (I don’t know where that expression has come from, except from the kids picture bible that we read him), so that will be something we try again.

And tonight the kids had the chance to try out a bubbler in an unusual way – good to see some teamwork.

A great week for imagination, waiting and running.

Quite a few thing son this week, and a long weekend too. A few things to try and remember. Friday night was a visit to M&L, for dinner. Huff and Puff had a lot of fun meeting Buster and Bonnie again – enormous dogs, but very friendly.

It was a bit of a late night for the kids, but they managed to hang in there, Puff playing iPhone games and Huff watching TV as they lay quietly on the couch.

Another week mostly in the shadow of Dad’s essay writing, but there were quite a few chances for some family time, plus we had the Grandragon around so the kids had a great week. Puff had plenty of time to develop his climbing skills – he’s continuing to improve in confidence.

Mum pointed out that Puff’s stilt walking has also greatly improved. He has to concentrate pretty carefully still, but he can walk reliably now.

Dad had Friday off so that Mum could be out for the day, so he took the kids to swimming lessons. They had a great time. It’s hard to believe how quickly they are improving. Huff is learning to be more confident in her floating, 

We managed to head out for a while to feed the ducks in a garden. It was a reasonable difficulty level – the ducks had some ibis friends who didn’t want to share the bread, and Huff has a tendency to feed very large pieces of bread to the ducks, but they had a great time.

After feeding the ducks, it was time to play an adapted Kogworks game called popcorn Kogworks and watch some Octonauts. Both kids were very interested in watching the popping of the popcorn.

Puff never really tired of Kogworks this week, playing game after game against Dad – he was a bit of a natural at it. He was struggling a bit more with tangrams, but enjoyed putting the shapes together.

Puff had his first walkathon this week. Huff went along too – they did a great job walking up and down hills to raise money for Puff’s preschool. 

For no reason: here’s Huff enjoying a babycino.

And one last picture: with the car keys safely stored elsewhere, Huff and Puff had a quick chance to see what it’s like to drive a car. Still a while to go before they’ll be able to see over the steering wheel and push the pedals at the same time!

Not many photos from this week: we were busy preparing for Grandragon’s surprise birthday celebration, and Dad has been alternately looking after both kids solo, and hiding out working on his essay.

While Dad was at work, Mum, Grandragon and the kids went to Camelia gardens to feed the ducks. Unlike the place we usually go, where the ducks are behind a fence, these ducks come out in search of the food. Puff wasn’t troubled at all, towering over the ducks as he does.

Huff, on the other hand, had more problems with the height difference, but soon warmed up, and was enjoying feeding the ducks. This jacket is a new favourite of hers. From her cot in the morning she stands up, then stretches to reach anything she can on the change mat. One morning Dad came in to see her wearing the jacket over her pyjamas. She’d even persuaded her brother to zip the jacket up!

Saturday morning was a big adventure with Dad: we drove to Eveleigh markets listening to some Beethoven (Puff still requests the “31 song”, i.e. Mozart’s symphony no 40. This disagreement over classical music led to exchanges like “I like Mo-zart best”. “Moat-zart”. “Moat-zart”. 

Once we made it to the markets, Puff ordered the blini – one for him and one for his sister. Huff managed about 1/3 or the snack. Her brother ate all of his, and the lion’s share of her leftovers, and then they managed a fair tilt at Dad’s breakfast afterwards!

Saturday lunch was Grandragon’s surprise birthday. Dad managed to keep the kids behaving pretty well throughout, but as a result didn’t take any usable photos. Then, Saturday night, Dad organised dinner for the kids and put them to bed. Next morning we had pancakes for breakfast and then took the kids to the park for some pre-church running around. Huff had a great time going in circles under this handrail.

Puff was bolder. This is him jumping around on the play equipment, but he was having a great time sliding head-first down the slides, and even going solo on the swings.

Mum took this snap during the night-time routine. Their childhood continues to go by so fast.

See you next week!

It’s been a packed week. A couple of very early starts getting Dad to a couple of very early appointments saw some extra-early bedtimes and some rugged up children.

Here they are having breakfast at the physio. Huff has had a love-hate relationship with ‘squeezey yoghurt” this week.

Here they are enjoying breakfast at The Grounds very early in the morning.

And what visit would be complete without looking at the animals? 

With some more time to fill in, Huff and Puff played at Sydney Park, where there’s a fairly high rope bridge. Huff was very brave with her brother to copy.

Not really enjoying the camera flash, but keen enough to ride in her own toy stroller that she strapped herself into it.

Swimming lessons remain a big favourite. Puff had the chance after class to show off his diving skills. He’s still learning how to direct himself downward through the water, but his confidence and resilience is very impressive. Huff learnt how to be a monkey, climbing around the edge of the pool unassisted.

Perhaps it’s the influence of Peppa Pig, but Huff was playing with this doll and this dinosaur, and the dinosaur was almost certainly chewing the doll.

Back outside again, Huff exerted her fearlessness with a few solo ladder climbs.

Puff had a chance to listen to “the ocean” firsthand in a cafe stop.

And Dad spent some time explaining some graphs and charts related to coffee brewing.

Sunday saw us take a “family fun day” outing to Manly, travelling by train, ferry and even bus at one point. We had very tired but happy children.

It’s possible that Huff learned to regret taking out her hair ties before travelling on the ferry – her hair went a little bit wild.

Dad really enjoyed having a balance of time spent working on his essay (thanks Aunty C for helping watch the kids on Saturday) and family time. It was a very pleasant week all told.

Winter has arrived at our place. The kids are responding to it by incredibly cute. Here they are in their slippers, dressing gowns and improvised hats. It might be a bit melodramatic – it wasn’t really that cold.

Mum took the kids out for a little snack at Grind: it’s great to see that the regular trips to cafes have paid off, and they can behave themselves quite well.

Saturday morning we had a friend who had composed a piece of music to go with Bertie and the Bear, and was running a series of activities for kids to learn more about music. It was a lot of fun, and Huff and Puff both enjoyed it. Here’s Puff, learning about the French Horn.

Huff was concentrating pretty hard on this drum that looks a lot like an iPad.

After that we headed down to Wollongong to help set up a coworking space: Puff had a great time helping assemble furniture, and we had a chance to play with this trolley (the kids were fine with it until it lay too flat).

Sunday was Mothers’ Day. Puff had decorated this photo frame at preschool, and had been talking about it for over a week. Mum was very happy with it.

We managed to have breakfast as a family before church, and even grab some lunch while we were looking for a present for the kids to give Grandma for the day.

Later in the week, Mum took Huff to The Grounds at Alexandria, where Huff was excited to see the famous pet pig Kevin Bacon.

Meanwhile, Puff had been getting his face painted at preschool. He decided he was called “Blue Dog”, and convinced Huff to call Dad “Daddy Dog” when back from work. This is in an established tradition of nicknames for Dad from Puff’s imagination. Huff loves to copy her brother, and learns a lot from him.

Dad had a day off this week to catch up on some college work, and managed to take Puff to and from preschool. Here’s Puff explaining marble run to Dad. We’d found 6 marbles, and he split them up so that he would have 3 and Dad would have 3. When another boy showed up to play with the toys, he redistributed the marbles so each person had 2: Dad was impressed at both the maths and the kindness.

Huff feels right at home visiting the preschool: here she is raking up leaves.

Walking back up the hill with the kids, Puff was expressing how happy he was that Dad had been to preschool, and  Huff stopped every couple of houses to hug Dad’s leg. It was very sweet.

Despite all the busyness of life, spending time with the kids enriches everything else that I do. Kel does a great job raising them. We’re blessed.

Another week with the Grandragon staying with us. Lots of adventures – Puff seems to have mastered the multi-storey cubby at Blaxland Riverside Park. If you’re thinking of visiting there, make sure you go on a weekday away from the school holidays – it’s much quieter. (Puff also had a go at the flying fox, but this was harder to photograph.)

Huff and Puff are big fans of Peppa Pig (in fact, Huff gave Dad a Peppa Pig stationery set for his birthday) – here they are sharing some screen time together while Bandit sits patiently waiting.

Huff and Puff were back at swimming lessons this week. Huff wasn’t happy at the prospect – she even told Mum “I no swimming. I cry”, as part of her attempts to get out of it. Once she was wearing a pair of loaned swimming goggles, though, her mood changed, and she was enjoying it a lot more.

Saturday saw us head to a friend’s fifth birthday party. Puff was keen to have his face painted again, as a green cat. He explained to the face painting clown how to mix blue and yellow to make the correct shade of green.

Meanwhile Huff, who had fallen asleep on the drive over, and refused to leave her Dad’s side for quite a while at the party, eventually consented to playing at the play-doh table.

Puff was pretty happy with his face painting. Here he is helping out with one of the parachute games.

It took Huff a long while, but she decided that having her face painted might be fun too, and asked not for a butterfly or a flower (as the face-painter suggested) nor a Peppa Pig, but a dinosaur. Dad looked it up, and showed up a Google images version of the image to her, and here was the result.

Huff managed to last the rest of the day quite well, though she was getting tired by the end of the day.

She was much happier the next day.

At breakfast on Sunday, Huff wanted to hold Dad’s hand. It was very cute.

Puff, not to be outdone, was a interested in the same thing soon enough.

After breakfast, Huff had a great time dancing around on the grass.

Here’s a photo of Puff heading home from preschool with Grandragon and Bandit.

Other highlights:

• Huff bringing Dad his birthday present, and then running out of the room to collect her present.
• Puff making an art gallery out of his paintings from preschool, and giving Dad a tour of the art gallery.
• Puff can float unassisted in the pool now.

Welcome to another week’s update, brought to you by Puff, who is mostly calling himself “Flami” (after an iPhone game character) again this week. Here is one of his recent artworks on the “Doodle Pro”. Dad walked into the kids’ room this week, and was greeted by both Huff and Puff as “Peck” (another iPhone game character).

With Anzac Day, after Dad and Puff came home from the dawn service, we decided to go out as a family to play at a park (and grab a coffee). Huff and Puff had a great time on the play equipment. Huff is getting more dexterous at her climbing.

They played near each other, if not together. Puff needed Dad’s help to figure out this maze. Huff wasn’t really interested in the maze – there was important sliding to do.

A trip to the bookshop later, we had books for each of them. A Hairy Maclary touch-and-feel book for Huff, and a “Don’t let the pigeon finish the activity book” book for Puff. Which he read. In its entirety.

On Saturday, Huff had a babycino with Dad. She enjoyed it, as you can tell by this moustache.

Then, later, we ended up at another, newly-opened cafe.

It wasn’t all good news this week. Grandragon spent some time in hospital, and the kids had lots of chances to visit. They were very well behaved, and lots of the other visitors gave us positive feedback about them.

Sunday morning we tried keeping Huff quiet in church with a couple of jigsaw puzzles. It was moderately successful.

Less quiet, but more successful, was the kids playing on Grandma’s piano. They were pretty gentle with the keys, all things considered.

Huff’s favourite thing to do at the moment is to draw. She has a very distinctive style.

Another week – we had a surprise visit from the Grandragon this week, which has been good timing, coinciding with the school holidays.

Puff is growing up: here’s a photo of him having climbed to the top of this structure.

Huff wasn’t doing so badly herself, climbing up the ramp to the right of the photo, and sliding down this enormous slide, then repeating it again and again to the point of exhaustion.

Puff had fun swinging here: it’s a little hard to tell, but he’s up in the air.

Huff preferred driving a pretend car

On a rainy day we had lunch in a cafe, where a friend read stories to Puff and Huff. Huff had a much better time than her expression might suggest.

Puff spent a lot of time sitting in a chair, reading by himself.

Huff, ever fickle, wanted Dad to read the same story to her.

Have we covered this before? When asked to smile on camera, Huff pulls awful faces at the moment.

Somehow Mum managed to persuade Huff and Puff to share a drink, and they carried it off without fighting.

In other news: the watermelon plant that we put in the ground just after Christmas has produced fruit. Puff was so excited when he found it that he yelled out, and Mum thought he’d hurt himself.

Another week gone! Happy birthday to Aunty C, who we saw a couple of times this week. 

Puff is strong enough to push his sister in a shopping trolley, which he had a great time with.

The kids had a chance to stay up very late when we went out for dessert and dinner with Aunty C for her birthday. Here they are making sure they both give her a present.

With the end of the swimming school term, Puff can swim 3m unassisted and float, so he was awarded a level 2 swimming certificate, which he was very happy about. They even made one for him with “Dragon” as the surname, though that seemed to be a result of confusion on their part.

Saturday brought us to Eveleigh markets for breakfast with friends. Puff was happy to have blini for breakfast again. Here he is looking serious (he’s regularly asking us to take photos of his food at the moment… occupational hazard I guess).

Huff managed to last a little while sitting politely and eating yoghurt, and eventually wanted to run around. She was very excited to see all the puppies at the markets.

But even more excited when Dad finally put the pretend sink into the cubby house. She danced on the cubby house floor for quite a while.

On Sunday afternoon, during a walk, Puff and Huff noticed they could see their shadows very clearly. Puff is convinced that his shadow is “almost as tall as Dad’s”, though he may still have some catching up to do. Here they are comparing their shadows.

Huff is much more confident at walking, and can even last for some distance walking a few blocks to get to the park. The kids were a bit worn out from all their adventuring, and have had quiet days for Monday and Tuesday, making the most of Puff’s school holidays.

One little thing to remember: Huff and Puff arguing over who was the character in “Oh the places you’ll go!” – they each thought that it was them, until the very last page when Huff conceded that it was (at least on that page), Puff.