An attempt to catch up! :S

Well, it's about time I updated my blog, don't you think?! ;) It has been over 3 weeks since I last updated, and I have been increasingly wanting to get the chance to update with a load of thoughts and plans in my head to write down. So much is happening in my days now that my head sort of spins on its axis (I know! Who knew my head had an axis?! Apparently so.) and so I never remember a THING from day to day what with all the round-and-round-and-round-and-round that my head is doing all the time. Best to write it down when I get the chance! So here I am :)

I am sort of keeping up with updating my pregnancy blog about Samuel's early weeks. He will be 5 weeks old tomorrow, which is amazing to me. How fast that has gone! He's so lovely, and we all love him completely. The boys' only complaint about him is that they don't get to see him enough because he's upstairs napping for part of the day! Benjamin turns out to be a wonderful big brother, at 18 months old right now. He has not been wary of Samuel at all, just like the others have not been with the sibling right below them when they were his age. I LOVE this age gap! :) He is so gentle with Samuel, and often stops as he passes him in the bouncy chair to stroke his head or put his arms around him in the chair saying, "Cuddoh!", or to give him a kiss with a sweet little peck sound. He hates it when Samuel cries, and fetches nappies for him when I ask him to, and brings him his own favourite toys often. I love watching Benjamin be a big brother! :)

Ohhh there's so much to "make note of" that I think I will just have to do a quick summary of each thing as I come to it, and then start another seemingly random subject in the next paragraph, otherwise I'll never get much of it written about before I have to stop for today!

Nathan turned 3 this month, on January 12th. I just can NOT believe that tiny boy is three! For a few weeks there I had three children aged 2 and under! :) So much fun! Neil had to work on Nathan's birthday, but he had a good day because that week my parents were here to visit, as it was Neil's first week back at work after paternity leave. They stayed with my grandparents and came to visit for the whole afternoon every day for 6 days. They played games with the boys and read stories, brought me lunch every day, and generally were lovely to have around!

Here's my daddy reading a story to Matthew, Nathan and Benjamin (they were forever presenting him with books to read - this is how all the boys are generally. They NEVER get tired of being read to, which is lovely!). Benjamin sees me! ;)



While he was doing that, my mummy was playing a fun geography game with Arthur (which she gave Matthew for Christmas, and he loves it too, but Arthur is intensely interested in geography so would play this at any opportunity!):



And Samuel was in the bouncy chair for a moment while I took photos! :) He was sleeping (2-and-a-bit weeks old here):



On Nathan's birthday they brought him a present and he had fun with them here. We had birthday cake (he asked specifically for a chocolate cake with chocolate icing and Smarties, and it had to have a James (from Thomas the Tank Engine) theme). I made him a cake with James copied onto it with ready-made writing icing. I wish I could have made a James-SHAPED cake but it was too much with everything being so new and exhausting that week! I also forgot to take a photo of the cake :( It's on video but I haven't uploaded it to see if there's any sort of evidence of it yet. I made Smarties into the number 3, so that incorporated his Smarties wish! :) Nathan got a few Thomas-related presents like stickers and a Thomas memory card game. He got some jigsaw puzzles - he LOVES doing those. He is putting together puzzles of up to about 30 pieces now, and those challenge him enough for now. Matthew is putting together 50-60 piece puzzles and can do those fine but will ask for help and think he can't manage without it! Benjamin is putting 2 pieces together, that sort of thing! ;) And Arthur is doing 150-200 piece puzzles, which he really enjoys doing. He sits and sings and hums and clacks his tongue and so on, happily in his own little world, while he puts puzzles together. Arthur's favourite puzzles are the world map with flags, or ones with lots of dinosaurs on, hehe! Nathan's are vehicle or Thomas related, but he'll do ANY puzzle because he so enjoys putting the pieces together and completing it. Matthew seems less enthusiastic in general about jigsaw puzzles than Arthur and Nathan, but still does them eagerly.

Oh yes! Nathan's birthday! Off on a tangent there! ;)

Sooo he is three! Officially a "big boy" in our family - this is the age we make a big thing about reaching. He has been quite happy to be a little boy until this month, and reminded me often that he and Benji were still "little boys". He is telling me how he weew not ever sit on a potty, but that he might do that when he's a big boy! I think that's why he's been reminding me such a lot that he's still a LITTLE boy, hehe! But now he is a big boy! We don't start potty training our boys until age 3 and a quarter at the earliest. Matthew was not ready in the slightest until a YEAR later than that. He is now 100% potty trained in the WEE department. He very rarely has an accident and can hold on if he needs to. He is still in nappies at night (we haven't even considered night time potty training yet for him), and he is NOT there with his poos yet. He still does all of his poos in a nappy. He just tells me when he thinks he needs to do one and asks for a nappy, so I put one on him. He has done a few on the big toilet and gets mightily rewarded for doing so, as per the consultant's recommendation last year! But he mostly opts for the nappy. He is still anxious about it, but we're just playing it cool and trucking on. The consultant he saw said that he is sure that Matthew doesn't have any physical problems, and that he'll get the hang of it eventually. He had a follow-up with a community support team but it was scheduled for Jan 11th and I could not manage to get all the little ones out to it so soon after having Samuel with Neil not here to help me, so I postponed it until March. We're not concerned about Matthew at the moment, and it's really just an appointment for reassurance. I know he's 4 and a half and "late" for potty training (he would be halfway through his first proper year of school if he wasn't homeschooled! Can't imagine putting him through that without being fully potty trained), but I know he'll get there in his own time.

Sooo, pretty soon I will start floating the idea with Nathan. If he asks sooner than April then we'll try it sooner. I think he'll be more ready than Matthew was, and it won't be such a difficult process this early. He DOES have major issues with poos, and has done for at least 6 months now. He won't do them. He holds on for several days, getting more and more miserable and worried in the last couple of those days, and then finally poos with much tears and screaming. We pretty much have to help him most of the time, because he resists the whole time and clamps his legs together. So that part might not be so good for the potty training! But hopefully it will be a different story on the potty, who knows? I am not feeling impatient at all about getting him out of nappies. I feel in NO hurry, and it's another thing that signifies him growing up so I am kind of sad to think of it, in all honesty! I have also been changing nappies without a break for 6 years, and 3 different children in nappies for the last 3 years, so I am 100% used to it now, and it will feel strange one day not to change a bunch of nappies all day long, lol! I actually like it. I know I'm probably strange, but I don't mind it at all. I do not miss cloth nappies one bit! ;) We used them for 3 years and now we have used disposables for 3 years and I have not looked back once, which surprises me. I did LOVE cloth, but I really really don't miss it. I like the ease of disposables, and with four kiddos in nappies I NEED that ease right now! ;)

We are back to school for the first time in MONTHS next week!!! So exciting! I set the first week of February as the time we'd start back up, because that would give me 6 weeks from having Samuel, and that's what the wise advice was at MOMYS. Also I had planned last summer that we would change our academic year to match the calendar year, instead of starting in September like the schools do. We were behind because I had been morning sick and we'd done very little school during that time. We did school through the summer and then stopped in September to do the Big Bedroom Swap and lay laminate flooring in the living room. That dragged on (ohhh did it drag on!) and then we sort of blinked and Neil was starting a new job at the beginning of November, which was a big change for us all. I reached full term in my pregnancy at the same time and, well, school didn't happen in the autumn after all. We did a loose school schedule and based it on an autumn theme, doing autumn crafts and learning as much about autumn-related things as possible from books. I like what we did so much that I am going to make a seasonal box for each season, to pull out when a new season starts! I got a lot of things for our autumn theme - squirrel, leaf and tree shaped cookie cutters, primary school age books on squirrels, hedgehogs, and seasonal changes for autumn, autumn stories and poems (lots of these!), and collage items, craft ideas, and printouts with an autumn theme. I think I will box all those things up together and bring them out next autumn, because it will be fresh and exciting to open it all up again by then, and I will have a bunch of ready-prepared things to get stuck into for the preschoolers (which will be Nathan and probably Benjamin by then as he'll be 2 and a quarter and will probably go for the crafty stuff!).

Anyway, so that was "school" in the autumn. We had a total break from the very end of November and haven't done anything since. Except that we've given the boys a free rein to explore and learn about anything they're interested in. I have been guilt-tripping all winter about it, hehe! But how surprised I have been, because Arthur has learned so much more in the months that I haven't done school with him, than when I was doing school before that! He wasn't reading as such before, when we were still doing our Rocket Phonics reading lessons. He COULD read the exercises in each lesson, so I guess he was reading. But he couldn't pick up an easy reader lying about the house and read it. He couldn't read Green Eggs and Ham yet or anything like that. Then I stopped teaching him. And now he's reading! He just taught himself, and I started to notice that he would tell me something he'd seen on a world map, and I would ask him how he knew it, and he just said, "I read it." So I began to wonder if maybe he could read more things than I thought he could. Over time he has become more and more fluent at reading, and sits reading the animal encyclopedia, the main encyclopedia and the children's atlas, usually at least a couple of hours a day in total. He used to pick up those books and beg me to read him facts from them, but I couldn't keep doing it for as long as he wanted me to! So in the end he seemed to just determine to read it himself! And he did!

When my parents came over, my mum brought some Oxford Learning Tree readers that she had found at the studio (my dad's business just closed - he ran a studio that made audio books, and when they cleared it out they found a TON of children's books and things in the book archives). She wondered if they would come in handy somewhere down the line. I don't know anything about that range, even after googling, because I couldn't seem to find out much about what sort of ages or abilities matched which books. The books she gave us were the complete set of level 6 and level 7 - very good to have! When I looked at them, the stories seemed way too hard for Arthur. I didn't KNOW that but I just thought they looked complicated. They had most of the different phonics combinations, silent letters, long words and so on, so I figured he would not be ready for that for a while, even though he's reading. I told my mum I was planning to do some sort of assessment on his reading when we started school again, so that I could see where I should pick up in his curriculum. Nice confident plan, but actually I had NO IDEA how I was doing to assess him or how I would know what to do next! Sometimes I wonder why on earth I am trying to teach my own children at home! ;) I really have no clue what I'm doing, do not be deceived if for a second you ever think maybe I do, hehe!

Anyway I put the books on the stairs to take up with me later in the day. Arthur saw them after my parents went home that day, and asked if I could read one to him. I told him they were readers, which he would read himself one day, and he was excited and wanted to read one RIGHT NOW! I told him he wasn't ready for them yet, because I thought the words inside were too hard for him right now, but that we'd learn more with Rocket Phonics soon and then he would be ready to read them in a few months maybe. He was determined to prove me wrong, and said he WAS ready and he was sure he could read them. He was so persistant that eventually I said he could try reading a Level 6 book. He chose the last book in that series and brought it downstairs to me, absolutely bristling with enthusiasm!

He read the whole book, cover to cover, fluently without a break. He did not struggle with silent letters or words with phonics sounds like "ou" or "ai" in them, or longer words like "adventure" or "dangerous". He asked me a couple of times what a word said - "light" was one of them, and I think "thought" was another. I was just speechless, because I totally did not have any idea that he could read like that! I knew he was reading stuff but I had never heard him sit and read a story to me, especially one that was quite a hard story for a young reader! It just wasn't something I expected, that's all. Soooo, now I don't know what to do with his phonics lessons! I am going to read through the Rocket Phonics curriculum this week to get an idea of where I should pick up lessons with him. Or whether it's possible that continuing the curriculum would be a bad idea? I don't want to be pedantic and boring about it, if he's chomping at the bit to devour stories and can do so much more than the curriculum is offering him. He still needs some instruction on various aspects of phonics though, so I am not sure how to play it really. For now, our reading lessons (when they start) will be Rocket Phonics for Matthew, and listening to Arthur read one of these readers every other day. They're quite long and he was tired after reading the last one, so I think half a book a day would be a better pace. It will help him build up his reading stamina in any case.

We are all eager to start maths again! It seems a long time since we've done that subject now, and the Right Start Math curriculum is SO much fun! I can't wait to start that up again with Arthur. He is about 8 or 9 lessons from the end of Level A, and we have Level B set up and ready to go. I will pick up where we left off with Arthur, and begin at lesson one of Level A with Matthew on Monday! How exciting!!! Matthew gets all breathless thinking about it, and his eyes shine, and my heart just melts when I see him look like that! He's such a sweetheart, and I love his excitement over starting school. He is in awe that he'll actually be allowed to start proper maths!

The only other academic thing I plan to focus on is writing. Just the 3 "R"s this year, and the rest child-led. Child-led has astounded me, but I get too nervous to actually pursue "unschooling" completely! It is just incredible how much Arthur knows for his age, and NONE of it has been taught by me. It's completely led by Arthur. He is passionate, and I do mean PASSIONATE about geography. He has several intense interests (animals, science, dinosaurs, history and geography - none of which are "subjects" that we've ever done at school yet) and spends time every day learning stuff about them. I absolutely cannot stop him, even when I WANT to (and sometimes I do!). He seems to me to particularly favour geography-related things. I asked him recently which of those subjects made him the most excited, and he said that was a difficult question to answer but he would have to say "the world" was his favourite thing to learn about. I asked him why, and he said, "I don't know... It's just so.... so INTERESTING!"

He has a globe and a children's atlas, and we look at online maps and things. He has books about animals that have information about the part of the world they live in, and so on. He remembers everything he is told, the first time he is told it. He has an amazing visual memory and if he sees a country on a map, and I ask him about that country at a later point, he'll trace the shape of it in the air with his finger as he's trying to describe it to me, so I know he "sees" it in his visual memory even having just seen it once.

He's especially interested in animals that have become extinct, and can tell me a lot of different animals that I've never heard of and the years they became extinct. He knows random facts about the world like Greenland is part of the Kingdom of Denmark, and there's a river dolphin in India (I forget its name, but Arthur doesn't!) which is critically endangered and there are only between 100 and 500 of them left. He can tell me all these distinct differences between dozens and dozens of different kinds of whales and dolphins (from a book) and how each one breaches and whether they're shy or inquisitive, endangered or locally common, and what exactly it is that is threatening their numbers. He knows all his continents and oceans, and can name pretty much any flag of the world by sight. He LOVES flags! :) My mum got him a Flags of the World sticker book for Christmas, and he has put all the stickers in place and now just sits reading it. From that book he has started to tell us the exact DATE this or that country adopted its flag!!

I am not remotely trying to brag about my boy here, but I am honestly just astounded by him on a regular basis. I also desperately want to record all this kind of thing somewhere so that I have reference of it as he learns more and gets older - stuff to look back on, and something to chart his progress sort of. I have been longing to write stuff here for a couple of months, but never found time. It is going to sound like I am showing off the stuff he can do or the things he knows, but I DON'T want to do that, because I don't care what other people think in any case, and also I can't stand it when other people do that about their kids! I would not want to. I just want to be transparent and honest about my thoughts about him, and also be honest about how excited I feel that he's so bright and learning at such a pace with such enthusiasm! I also LOVE how it's nothing to do with me, haha! I can't boast in anything, other than the LORD who gave him the brain that he's got. I'm proud of him but I really can't take any PRIDE in it, you know? And that's good for me.

Also I should probably be honest and say that a lot of the time I really struggle with having an Arthur around when he's zinging with information! I LOVE having my Arthur around, of course, but it's the part where he never switches off for a millisecond, from waking at 6.15am or so, to falling asleep at 8pm or so. Random and quick example: last night I tucked him into bed, put my arms around him and told him for the 7th time to stop talking and asking me questions because now it's time to go to sleep. There was finally quiet for about 30 seconds. I pulled back from him and stroked his hair off his forehead and whispered, "Night night lovey. Have sweet dreams." He replied, "What's 12 and another 12? I can't remember, and we haven't done maths in AGES so it's not adding up right on the abacus in my head." I feel WEARY sometimes, and I feel guilty for that because it's TOTALLY AND UTTERLY A WONDERFUL THING that he's like this, learning and eager and never wanting to stop. I should embrace it every single second and give give give to him at every opportunity, no matter if it's starting to frazzle my brain or tire me out. I shouldn't think, "Oh please just STOP telling me facts! Please BE QUIET about the bowhead whale! I really just don't CARE any more about when Macedonia adopted its flag! NO MORE QUESTIONS, PLEASE!!!" And I certainly shouldn't think that on even a semi-regular basis. I feel guilty. But honestly it does drive me absolutely batty a lot of the time. He is so intense! Everybody comments on it, EVERYBODY. My dad says he's glad that Arthur is being homeschooled because he thinks Arthur would have a hard time from other kids at school, and be bored senseless in any case. That sounds a bit extreme but I believe he's right because it was my own experience and Arthur is uncannily like I was at his age, in the same ways too. My grandfather thinks Arthur is "exceptional" and therefore should have the benefit of being in school. *sigh* I think I am doing a good thing for him, and depsite my struggles with his intensity sometimes, I do love teaching him new things and hearing his enthusiastic chatter. I love seeing him learn and grow and change, and I consider it an incredible privilege to be the one to share it with him, to be involved entirely in every aspect of his learning. I would NEVER rather send him to school, even for the "break". I can't fathom having or even wanting a break, physically, from any of my kids! Mentally, maybe, for some quiet-head time, but I wouldn't want them away from me just for the sake of me. It seems sad to me when I hear mothers saying they don't know what to do with their kids because it's the school holidays, or bad weather - are they so unused to the constant company of their children?! How sad, if so! :( Or the other one about not being able to wait until school starts again so they don't have to have the constant company of their children! It seems almost universal too. I do not get that at all, and it makes me feel sad.

Samuel just woke for a feed and it's getting late now so I will have to stop. Oh but the other aspect of school this year is going to be Bible-based, and general focus on learning about God (and living for Him), and some Scripture memorisation too. I want to do much more than we managed to do last year, because it's more important than all the academic stuff put together. I'll also build in a part of our school morning for them to learn about anything they are interested in, since that seems to be going so well! I also want to start preschool as a regular block in the morning before school, with Nathan and Benjamin. Just motor skills and stuff like cutting, sticking, colouring, jigsaws, crafts, etc. I can't WAIT to really get stuck into school this year! Next year we'll start science, geography and history as subjects, definitely with a curriculum for science (I'm pretty set on Apologia Science so far but will wait to buy it until nearer the time, in case I find anything I somehow like better (but I doubt it!)), and maybe a curriculum for the others, if I find one I like. So far I think I may end up just doing geography and history "off the cuff" (!!) instead of from a curriculum, as I think that will suit us better. Music! That's the other thing! Oh but no time to talk about it now, tsk! Must go to bed!

Other things to mention another time (so I don't forget!):

* Photos! Loads to post.
* New vehicle! Trading in our Citroen C8 (7-seater minivan) for a Renault Trafic (9-seater minibus) NEXT WEEKEND!!!
* Benjamin's stuff - speech, mannerisms, sweet little habits, things he's doing now, etc. Loads of changes for little Benjaminny! Love that sweet little manny!
* Haircuts - just starting another round of much-needed haircuts! Have done Nathan's last week, and need to do the other three this week. Benjamin first (gulp! Not sure he'll tolerate it!) because his is actually getting in his eyes.
* More school-y waffle, hehe! Thoughts and plans and ideas! I'm just so excited about it!
* Neil's work - going well! Good things in the pipeline perhaps, too!
* Moving thoughts - we need to move this year.
* Just waffle about being Mummy to my five littlies :)
* Probably tons more but I am forgetting it all now. Must go to bed!

Hopefully I will update again soon!

Oh and thank you Annie for the links you keep posting! :) I DO like you to post them, and am definitely still interested in adoption blogs! Thanks for taking the time to tell me about them! I haven't looked them up yet but I will do!

It's Neil's birthday tomorrow, although he'll be at work. Today the three eldest boys each made a card for Daddy - Nathey is doing great with scissors and glue, I am noticing! A first for him today! We also made a birthday cake together in the afternoon, so it has been a fun day. Benjamin and Samuel took their naps - I have no choice but to make SURE they coincide, which is very helpful for the other three doing "big boy" activities while they sleep (and school, next week!). So tomorrow we'll do cake and presents at some crazy hour (7am? Earlier?!) before Neil has to go to work. He gets home right as they are about to get in bed, so it can't really be done then. It's a long day without Daddy for the boys :( But I hope he has a good birthday, and I'm glad he'll have cake to take with him! And the boys are SO excited! They love a birthday! :)

Benjamin's 1st Birthday!

Finally a catch-up post on Benjamin's first birthday! I have a lot of photos to share, and wish I had more time to write "stuff" to go in between them, but it is already late! My laptop finally came back from being fixed today, and I can now access my photos again, hooray! :) So, without further ado...

On July 9th, my sweet little Benjaminny turned ONE! A whole year old. Amazing. He napped for a long time during the morning so we didn't do much birthday-specific stuff. After lunch, he opened his presents, and then napped again, and we had his birthday cake after dinner.

Here are the first photos I took of him that day - tasting cows milk for the first time! They say 12 months for starting cows milk, so we usually just make it a "first" on their first birthdays. Sometimes ice-cream too! :) Here is Benjamin swigging back his drink at lunchtime (he had cheese, cream cheese sandwiches and Nutella sandwiches, because those are his favourites!), without knowing there was milk inside it! I he gave us "looks" as he realised it was different - I'm not sure what he made of it! He does much prefer my milk still, but it has pretty much dried up now so I am glad that he will tolerate cows milk in the meantime. He's still nursing just the same, for comfort, and that's GREAT with me because I actually want him to still be nursing when the new baby (and new MILK!) arrives in December, and then hopefully carry on until at least age 2. :)









After lunch, he had some tumble time with Daddy (mostly involving Benji being eaten or tickled - how he LOVES this game!). You can see how much he enjoyed it from the photos! :)











A little while later, the boys were eager for Benjamin to open some presents, as we STILL hadn't got to that part of his birthday yet! He was acting so sleepy and seemed really ready for another nap, but we brought his presents out and he opened two or three before heading off for his nap (he opened the rest afterwards, but I didn't get pictures of that). As I brought them, everybody started singing "Happy Birthday" to him, and ohhhh he just sat and beamed around at us all! I had no idea he would love being sung to like that so very much, being the centre of adoring attention, haha! He's the centre of adoring attention a LOT around here, but this was a certain intense focus and he really enjoyed it! So much so that when we stopped and set the presents down, he didn't take any notice of them at all, just started sort of making a sing-song sound with "words" that went, "Naa-naaa, naaaaa, na-na-naaaa" etc, over and over. He was giving us intent LOOKS as he did so, and we eventually realised he was "singing" Happy Birthday to try to get us to sing it to him again, haha! Sweet little peanut! :) So we did, and he breathed a heavy, happy sigh of relief and basked in the joy of us singing to him again, smiling round at us. As soon as we stopped, he prompted again, and again and again, ALL day long, hehe! In fact, just today after lunch he ate something or other with chocolate on it (I can't remember how or what it was!) and sat rocking in his booster seat at the table, singing, "Naa-naaa, naaaaa, na-na-naaaa..." and on and on, until I recognised it as his little "Happy Birthday" song from last month! The boys started singing Happy Birthday to him straight away and he beamed so happily at them, and enjoyed their singing right to the very end! It was obvious that he was remembering the association between the chocolate and the song we sang him as we ate his chocolate birthday cake on his birthday! :)

Anyway! So the first photo here is an odd one - he looks tired out, and like he's letting his mouth hang open or something! But I took it because it was the only "caught" memory of him "singing" Happy Birthday to himself! :) The boys were very excited about the present-opening and helped him a lot with the wrapping paper. He wasn't too interested at first, but he soon enjoyed pulling the paper if we started it off for him.













He got a CD of African music (for children), which ALL the boys love! We looked at the information about the various countries in Africa that the songs came from, and then put the CD on. Benjamin reached and reached for the CD player when the music started (a good sign that he really liked the music!). He likes to bop to some of the songs still, and we usually have this CD on several times a day still. Arthur and Matthew love it so much, and we have learned such a lot about Africa since Benjamin's birthday! (never mind my hair in this photo - it was having an unruly "frizz" day for some reason!)





After Benjamin's nap they played with the new toys and Benjamin opened a present of a few books from my mum. I didn't get photos! But then came dinner (spaghetti bolognese, because it was his joint favourite meal, along with my pesto/tomato pasta sauce on fusilli!), and after that we sat the boys at the school table for birthday cake! I didn't get a photo of the cake before we ate it, but never mind. You can pretty much see it from the first photo, but some of it is out of shot. I made a big sheet cake (the usual chocolate cake with chocolate fudge icing - Benjamin really liked that at Matthew's and Grandoug's birthdays, so I made it for his too!) and cut it into the shape of a big "1". I put one candle on it and Smarties all around the edge to set it off and look fun. Smarties are a treat for our boys so I knew they would like that. Benjamin has not had them before though, obviously!

I carried it in and everyone sang "Happy Birthday" and Benjamin looked SO pleased with life, hehe! He was fascinated by the candle but even though he looks like he's starting to reach for it in the first photo, he wouldn't actually reach out to touch it. He just wanted to see it. The boys blew it out for him, since he was too mesmerised by the flame to even take in the idea of blowing at it, lol! As soon as the candle was blown out, he set to work scraping the Smarties off the cake - not to put in his mouth, just for the fun of it I think! Funny boy! :) They all tucked in, and as expected, Benjamin reeeally enjoyed his birthday cake. The photos tell the story really - he got pretty messy and was rather possessive of his piece of cake! ;) Once it was finished, he even tried to start on the piece of kitchen roll in front of him that had some fudge icing on it, hehe!























Neil ran a bath while they were finishing their cake, and Benjamin went straight from the table to the bath! ;) Until that day, he had still been getting his baths like a baby - in the big bath but on his own without the bath toys that the big boys play with. I would just sit him in, wash him, and lay him back to wash his hair. He loves his baths and so we didn't change a thing, until that day. I just suddenly thought since they all needed a bath INSTANTLY (they were all pretty chocolatey!), he might enjoy sharing a bath for the first time! We chose to pair them up (and generally still do, though they had their first bath ALL together last week, and the second one today - sweet sweet photos to come!!), and put Benjamin in the bath with Matthew. Nathey sometimes screeches and fusses when we wash his hair, and we didn't want to pair Benji with him because we thought he might get a bit freaked out by Nathan's noise! He had a lovely time in the bath with Matthew, and very much enjoyed the bath toys. He would not stop drinking out of all the cups and containers, no matter how we tried to dissuade him! ;) Matthew LOVED bathing with Benjamin, and Arthur was a bit put-out not to get the opportunity, but we switch their pairs frequently so they both get the chance. They LOVE Benjaminny-bean-boo! We all do! :)



After his bath, my four crazy little boys played some sort of racing game on all fours around the living room, shrieking and laughing continually (one of Benjamin's favourite games to play with his brothers - they love it too!). I sat and spectated for ages and could not stop smiling at them because they were so funny and sweet, all stark n*ked crawling around, with wild hair from being quickly towel-dried before they streaked off! ;) They continued until at least two of them had hiccups from laughing so hard, and then we got them into pyjamas and ready for bed.

The last photo I got of Benjamin on his birthday was of "teeth time", just after all the boys had their teeth brushed (they're all little enough to need us to brush their teeth still - Arthur would prefer to do his own but he doesn't get that privilege till he's 7! Good dental hygiene is just too important and the dentist recommends parents brushing children's teeth until age 7 so that it's done thoroughly enough, so that's what we're doing! He gets more free-rein in the mornings though). Benjamin LOVES having his teeth brushed! He only had 3 at his birthday (first bottom one onnnly just came through) and now has two at the top and two at the bottom (nothing more in the works yet). He has a teeny little pink toothbrush, because they randomly select the colour when you order them for a supermarket delivery (which we do!), and they brought pink! He loves it! So I am glad to have a picture of him with his little pink toothbrush at the end of the day on his birthday :)



They all seemed pretty tired out, but Benjamin didn't breastfeed to sleep. He often doesn't, and then I usually rock him in my arms, or else put him in his cot and sit next to it while he gets settled, and read. This time he finished nursing at 7.15pm or so, and I held him in my arms and sang Happy Birthday to him really softly as I rocked him, and some other songs, just letting him get sleepy. I watched the clock the whole time, because I remembered that at 7.15pm a year before, I was nearly there, starting to want to push, and getting ready to meet him. He was born at 7.30pm and I was so thankful to be in the same room a year later, walking him back and forth at the side of the bed - the same bed where he was born. I could almost see myself there as I walked and sang, a year ago. At 7.28 I knew my waters broke, and it was just such fun to relive it all in the same location, with the overwhelming gratitude that I had the same sweet precious baby boy in my arms going off to sleep, exactly one year later. At 7.30pm I sang him Happy Birthday again and felt quite tearful and just immensely happy and in love with my sweet Benji-boy. After another 10 minutes or so (where I just wanted to hold him, never mind if he wanted to go to bed, lol!), I put him in his cot and he slept.

Ahh, my sweet little Benjaminny! I am so happy to be his Mummy, and so thankful that God saw fit to bless us with him! I can't even put into words how VERY much I have enjoyed his first year, and while it's a bit sad that it's behind us now, I do look forward to the year ahead and the years beyond that. I don't really think too far ahead though, generally - I am too busy enjoying the moment! :)

I have more photos to come - quite a few of Benjamin, and I need to also post a catch-up photo post very soon about our trip to the beach, which we took the very next day after Benjamin's birthday! It was perfect weather and we just piled them all into the car and DID it! It was a lovely day, and I took lots of photos, which I'll post very soon! :)

Family gathering :)

Just a catch-up post! I wanted to post some photos of the family gathering we had a few days before Benjamin's birthday. My grandfather (Grandoug, as we have always called him, since his name is Doug!) turned 85 on the 5th of July, and he usually likes to have the family round for the day with a nice lunch in the garden. I LOVE Grandoug's birthday "bashes", because it's the only opportunity in the whole year when my family gets together. I love seeing my family, especially all together! I have a really small family. Each of my grandparents (on my dad's side - my other grandparents died a while back) are only-children, and my dad is an only child too. My mum has only one sister and she only had one child, so the whole family is very small! We never see my mum's sister and my cousin - they live a way off and I don't know, visiting just never really happens. But my grandparents live about 30 minutes drive away. They have always lived close and been involved in our lives as much as possible and I love that about them!

So our Big Family Gathering actually only involves 14 people, including children! ;) But it's so much fun! My parents live in France as you know, and so they don't always come over, but this year they did! :) I LOVE to see my parents! Bennie (my brother) and Sarah were there with their two little ones, and it was lovely. I took lots of photos because I so wanted to capture the event for prosperity, just to look back on fondly. They have a garden which the little ones love to run about in and play, and we took a little pop-up tent and some toys. My mum (Nana to the grandchildren!) took books to read to them. All the little ones LOVE Nana and Grandy!

I just wanted to post photos!

Lunch! My little ones LOVE Yorkshire puddings - they're so picky and that's about all they ate from the main course. *sigh* Dessert was yummy, and there were CHOICES! Matthew needed a serious wipe-down after eating chocolate ice-cream! ;) (I finally cut Matthew and Arthur's hair in time for that weekend - yay!):







My lovely Daddy watching his grandchildren from the table, and my beautiful Mummy with her newest grandchild - Rasmus (4 months here - isn't he GORGEOUS?!?!):




Playing football with the beach ball we took with us, and Benjamin's thoughts on the lawn (not great pics, but oh well)! Poor lovey! The grass was all dry and prickly and he did not like it one bit! He kept trying to crawl without using his knees, and then without using his feet, hehe! And then getting really fed up when he couldn't manage crawling without using either his knees OR his feet! ;) We either carried him about or let him crawl on a blanket, after a while.





Grandoug has various watering cans and a hosepipe attached to the garden tap, and the boys discovered it! Grandoug let the little ones come and get their cans filled and water the garden, and OH how they loved the privilege! Here they are watering :)






My mum brought her copy of A.A. Milne's "When We Were Very Young" (which she read to me when I was little!) and the little ones all sat around her and listened while she read it in the garden after lunch.



The grown-ups played football with the little ones (mainly Arthur and Matthew, though Nathan joined in here and there) for quite a while until they were all hot and tired out, and then Granny brought out ice-lollies for everyone! :) Here are the little ones under the weeping willow with Nana, eating their lollies (and looking somewhat bemused at me taking photos, for some reason!):




This is what Neil and Benjamin were doing during the "lolly break"! Benjamin's naptime arrived and he was rubbing his face and fussing constantly. I brought the Ergo with us, presuming to put him on my back at naptime so he could have a sleep, but when it came time for it, I felt so tired out that I didn't know if I could do it! Neil was happy to wear Benjamin for his nap, even though it took a fair bit of walking around the garden! Such a sweet daddy! :) Benjamin zonked right out after about 10 minutes but he stirred if poor Neil stood still for too long! He napped about 30 minutes in the end, which is way shorter than his normal naps, but much better than no nap!




After he woke up, he even let Nana cuddle him! He is wary of anyone unfamiliar picking him up or even approaching him sometimes. He warmed to Nana quite quickly though, as they all seem to! :)




Birthday cake time! Tradition has it that I always make Grandoug a birthday cake for the family gatherings, ever since my teens. Often I do a novelty one and work to amuse or surprise everyone when it's revealed - that's always fun! But the last few years I have been hard pushed to get a cake baked and decorated and everyone out for the day in time, so they have been a bit more basic! Everyone's favourite is the usual milk chocolate cake with chocolate fudge icing that I make for the boys' birthdays. It's all I seem to bake, but it's always because it's requested, not because I can't make any other varieties! ;)



More confirmation of how Benjamin loves him some chocolate birthday cake (I baked his birthday cake only 4 days later!) - he was sitting on Neil's lap when Neil was trying to eat his piece, and it was demolished in minutes!




Near the end of the afternoon, Grandoug wanted a family photo which we thought might be near impossible to achieve! Then I remembered I have a timer on my camera, so I set it up so that everyone could be in the photo. The little ones were so patient at the front while I did a few test-runs with poor outcomes, lol! I had to press the button and then RUN back to my place, and I had the 1.7mm lens on the camera so it had to be FAR away from everyone! ;) I am not hugely pregnant yet, but it was not a graceful manouvre, I can tell you, hehe! Nathan went all shy at the last minute and would not leave my arms, so in the end I had to press the button on the camera with Nathan in my arms and then run with him back to my spot - hence the fact that I'm flustered, breathless and not even composed for the photo (or looking at the camera!) by the time it snapped! ;) This is my lovely family:



We had such a nice day! Having learned from last year, we gave the boys sandwiches and stuff at 6pm before we left and then put their night nappies and pyjamas on, and drove home. In the past we've arrived home at 6.30ish only to have to feed and put to bed several very tired and cranky boys, and they've ended up with a really late bedtime when they needed the opposite! So this time Nathan was asleep before we even arrived home, and transferred to bed for the night without waking (even when we brushed his teeth, bless him!!), and the other boys all went straight to bed after brushing their teeth and were asleep quickly. We were EXHAUSTED - I felt quite nauseous and lightheaded for the evening which I put down to not drinking enough fluids during the hot afternoon, and also just being up on my feet way more than I usually am. I'm starting to feel tired and breathless a lot more with the pregnancy now, so I need to take it easy where I can and remember my fluids - and I hadn't that day. But it was such a lovely day! :)

I will post again soon - I have MUCH to say, especially about school, and yet more photos! I want to catch up about Benjamin's birthday, and the trip to the beach we took the day after as well! :) SOON, I promise!