puff and huff

Everyone is slowly getting better (Huff has a bit of a cough), and so we managed a few more interesting things this week. A trip to sushi train saw Puff mostly reading his dinosaur book: this seems to be an activity that Mum and Dad enjoy more than the kids do – they’re quite adventurous until it comes time to eat the food, and then they lose their nerve a little, and revert to eating edamame beans.

It was open week this week at school, so Mum, Dad and Huff had the chance to see some of the things Puff has been doing in class – here he is making numbers with a flip chart, and matching visual aids.

We let the kids play with some screens during a cafe trip on Saturday morning, knowing that it was going to be a day with a fair bit of queueing, and helping them pace themselves.

The kids went to their first ever Colin concert the same day – we queued up to meet Colin: he was incredibly gracious and patient with everyone who wanted to talk to him.

Screentime in cafes notwithstanding, we’ve been encouraging the kids to play offline a fair bit – in the foreground, Huff is playing with a cash register, while in the background Puff built a complex structure for his little toys to jump around on (yes, this was inspired by a video game, but at least it’s a jumping-off point for some creative play, right?)

Huff is a big fan of adding washi-tape to her drawings at the moment, making lots of little artworks that are adorning various parts of the house. It’s impressive to watch her skills with tape dispensers and scissors.

Dad and Puff spent most of this week being sick. It’s still a bit of a mystery, but Dad is now taking antibiotics, and Puff has been resting up for a few nights. We thought he was well enough to go back to school on Monday, but after school, he only lasted until 4:30pm and went to sleep. (Note that while Puff isn’t 6 yet, the pharmacist said he was big enough to have the 6+ Strepsils).

Despite both feeling unwell, Dad and Puff both went to a nodebots day on Saturday, playing with circuit boards and getting them to do different things. It was a fun way to spend a day, and a chance (hopefully) for him to seed a few ideas for when he’s a bit bigger. We’ve since played with the gear again, so that’s a promising start.

Huff is becoming more confident at climbing around. Not sure if this particular photo was her showing off her climbing, or combining that with avoiding the dog, but she’s having a great time.

She’s having a great time at breakfast here: she’s been very cuddly this week, and more keen than usual to have her Dad around.

We also watched a few DVDs: How to Train your Dragon, Monsters Inc, and Up. They were all a bit too scary for the kids in places, but they generally enjoyed them. We might have to tone things down again for their ongoing movie watching (or skip more scenes).

Hopefully, everyone will be well by next week.

Back into the routine of school again, with swimming lessons to start up in another couple of weeks.

Mum and Huff came into the city to have lunch with Dad one day this week – Huff was pretty excited to see Dad, and was happy walking along the streets with him.

On Saturday, we had nothing booked in, so we drove up to the mountains, hoping to see snow. Sadly there was no snow, but we had a lot of fun. The kids had something of a picnic on this cushion-covered spot in the cafe we visited in Blackheath.

We went back to Logan Brae orchard, where Puff spotted something that reminded him of one of his favourite video games – Leo’s Fortune.

The kids were excited to be back at the orchard, where there’s apple tasting and apple pies (though Huff was more interested in the fresh apples, and Puff’s eyes were a little bigger than his stomach).

We sat down on a seat near the orchard and looked at the mountain and the trees.

On Sunday, Dad took the kids for a pre-church walk. Huff was excited to see a letterbox that had her age on it.

And next door, we found a letterbox with Puff’s age on it. Puff explained we’d have to cross the road and walk further to find a letterbox with Dad’s age on it.

We visited all the grandparents over the weekend, including some board game time at Grandma and Doc’s house, which was a lot of fun.

See you next week!

The school holidays are over already! Dad spend some time on the eve of school going back talking Puff through the upsides and downsides of holidays being finished – turns out it’s mostly the screens he will be missing, and sure enough he had a great first day back.

But first, thinking back through the week. Huff and Puff came to visit Dad at work (and wanted to do some drawing on the computer).

They even caught the train in to work with Dad one morning – here they are waiting patiently for coffee (or at least hot chocolate).

From there, it was a visit to the Powerhouse Museum. Dad had a long lunch (and then stayed back at work), and folded some paper with them. In the meantime, they explored the Wiggles exhibition.

Puff had a great time climbing on the play equipment.

On Friday, Dad took the day off to take care of the kids while Mum had a doctor and dentist appointment. The morning was spent walking the Como bridge. The kids did a great job walking about 3km, and had fun playing on the play equipment in between. This is the trip back: they were a bit tired (should have listened to Dad as to when it was time to go, but it’s hard to turn down a playground).

We had different meals with different people: W, G and J, C, J and E, and Grandragon. There was lots of time playing screens: Tengami, Leo’s Fortune, Two Dots, and more.

Even Huff is interested in watching Puff play the occasional game, putting down her own screen for a while.

Oh, and Huff has started experimenting with pulling faces.

Next week will be one of adjusting to being back at school: there was already a lot of homework to do just from the first night back!

This week Huff seems to have progressed from getting up every night in the middle of the night, with Tweak, and visiting Mum and Dad in the middle of the night, to sleeping through. Time will tell.

We visited Uncle M and O this week, and Huff had the chance to try out a headlamp for the first time. Both kids were fascinated with having a torch they could play with, and had a good time.

Friday morning, Dad and Puff caught the train into the city together to go to coffee mornings before Dad started work. He wasn’t too happy about not playing screens on the train: this was his reaction. Screens continue to be a challenge for Mum and Dad to figure out: how much time is appropriate.

To that end, Puff picked a book about minecraft, and Huff picked a Thomas the Tank Engine book / play set.

Saturday night we took the kids to a bonfire a friend was running. The kids were a bit tired, but had a great time.

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We toasted giant marshmallows: the kids tried to eat them, and had about half a one each.

Huff even made shadow puppets with her hands by torchlight.

Huff went to get a haircut.

And Puff and Huff went on a swing together.

Puff also had his first McDonalds birthday party.

And Huff helped Mum make some cupcakes, to take to a friend’s house.

We had some anxious moments this week talking Huff through her new toy “Caterpillar”, who was briefly ostracised by the other toys for “looking at them all the time”. They have since apologised (individually, with Huff doing all the voices), and are now spending time together, again.

Despite loads of family time this week, it’s been a bit of a photo drought. Perhaps we’ve been letting them play more screens than usual, and more crafting activities, which are less interesting to photograph.

We had a lot of family time over the weekend, including trips to a couple of park. When it was quiet, Mum let Puff run up the slide, with missed success, as you can see/hear in the video.

Huff and Dad went to the Botanic gardens to give Mum a chance to sleep when she wasn’t feeling well. We had a lovely picnic, and watched the ducks wrestle, and even checked how cold the water in the pond was.

We were surprised at how well Huff took to this play equipment: it involved some moving her centre of balance around so she could spin.

A visit to Fagan Park (we’d never been before) was a chance to look around at a lot of types of gardens, and also have the kids run around and burn off some energy. It must have worked: the kids both slept in the car afterwards!

We also managed to fit in a visit to Doc, and a visit to see Uncle M and O, Dad preached at church, and there was the usual work, end of school term, and lots of craft being made. We also had a post-preaching baby lunch with E, uncle J, aunty C, and Grandragon, and then Dad walked home with Huff and Puff, who found it a little too far to travel, but managed to get a second wind at the critical moment.

A few adventures to report on from this week. Mum and Dad had lunch with Huff while Puff was at school: she was playing with an old phone, and started taking photos of coffee: I have a feeling Dad’s hobby might have advanced to the next generation.

Huff went with Mum to the dentist. She officially has 20 teeth.

Puff went with Dad to a cafe on our way to a friend’s house. He picked a cupcake based on looks, not realising the tiny stars were made of fondant. Dad had to finish the cupcake for him.

At the friend’s house, Huff played with an excellent kitchen-and-tea-party set, which she enjoyed a lot (Dad may have stacked the cupcakes in this multi-layered presentation).

On Sunday Dad and Puff went on an epic walk, including slurpees. Warning: if trying the pop rocks that go with slurpees, they will probably jump back out of the cup – keep your eyes clear of the danger zone!

Out shopping with Mum, Huff almost lost her lunch to a new feathered friend, and then asked if we could get one as a pet. 

Overall it was a good week for counting our blessings, and enjoying family time together wherever possible. We even met a new baby (though oddly, we have no photos: it’s someone else’s news.

We spent some time outdoors this week. A fairly traditional normal week, and then the weekend we had a birthday party, and then – with the car not behaving as well as we’d hoped – we resorted to some public transport and some walking to get to and from church.

We start with a birthday party for a friend: Dad and the friend’s Dad went to school together: it was good to catch up, and see how much everyone had grown. Huff’s favourite thing was blowing bubbles around the place (she was much smaller than most of the kids there).

One of the games, in pairs, was to see who could wrap someone in toilet paper the fastest. Huff gave up after a while, saying “this is boring”, and Puff was relatively co-operative, but there were still some technical problems. Points to Mum for suggesting a stick in the middle of the toilet roll would help the unrolling process go much quicker.

Sunday morning Dad made pancakes, and then he caught the train (one station) to church with the kids. The extra pancakes were a welcome surprise.

We all walked home again afterwards, taking a bit of a bush track some of the way. Mum was full of lessons about various plants and other things Dad knows little about, and the kids were soaking up the knowledge.

We saw this sign near the end of the trail, and it seemed an appropriate spot for a family photo.

This week has slowed down: Dad was sick for about half the week, but there were a few things we managed to fit in.

We’ve picked up some rosin for Puff’s bow, so he’s been spontaneously practicing a few times this week.

Saturday morning Dad was feeling better, so he took the kids for a walk from one suburb to another: we’ve driven past the pathway a few times, and the kids remember the walk!

From there we headed south to visit some relatives and see their new place – they have a lot of autumn trees, and the kids were enjoying some time playing in the leaves.

This one is a bit staged, but it was worth slowing Huff down enough to snap a picture of her face.

Saturday night we visited Grandma and Doc’s house briefly, and Puff saw his uncle working on a motor bike – he was impressed with the complexity.

Saturday night Dad and Puff took Doc out to the Sydney Observatory  – we had a great time learning about the universe.

We walked back through the Vivid festival, but there were so many people taking photos that it was hard to stay around for any length of time, but Puff enjoyed it.

Week 300! It’s been a long time of blogging about the kids: everyone has been a bit sick this week in different ways.

We had dinner out one night with the kids mostly trying dips: Huff had been randomly throwing up (“spilling”) during the week, with no other symptoms, and seems to have stopped now.

Puff continues to stretch his skills out with loom bands.

Friday night we went to see the vivid festival, though we brought our own glow sticks.

There wasn’t as much for kids to interact with as previous years, but they had a good time.

Dad took Huff through a blue tunnel of light that was testing the forward-facing camera of the phone to its limits!

And Puff didn’t manage to stay up as late as Huff, after a week of school.

We have Peppa Pig to thank for Huff’s enthusiasm for puddles – she was excited to be able to play outside after church in a selection of puddles.

Visiting Doc for his birthday, Huff had a chance to try on O’s helmet. It’s still a bit too big, but she loved it.

We’re hoping that next week will be less impacted by sickness.